| 1 | [[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/x_com_2.jpg]] |
| 2 | [[caption-width-right:350:[[LaResistance Join Us]] or [[FinalSolution Become Them.]]]] |
| 3 | |
| 4 | ->''"Welcome back, Commander."'' |
| 5 | -->-- '''Central''' |
| 6 | |
| 7 | ''XCOM 2'' is the 2016 {{sequel}} to ''VideoGame/XCOMEnemyUnknown'', developed by Creator/FiraxisGames. |
| 8 | |
| 9 | Twenty years have passed since the aliens launched a devastating invasion of Earth. The XCOM Project, Earth's last line of defense, was defeated by the invaders, and world leaders [[TheBadGuyWins quickly ordered a ceasefire in the hopes of negotiating a surrender]]. Now Earth exists under the rule of the [[VichyEarth ADVENT Coalition]], a seemingly benevolent OneWorldOrder ruled by the alien "Elders", which uses advanced extraterrestrial technology for the betterment of mankind. |
| 10 | |
| 11 | But under this façade, the aliens rule with an iron fist. Dissidents are made to disappear, soldiers are brainwashed and augmented beyond recognition, and only those on the fringes of society dare to think for themselves. [[PerspectiveReversal Now the roles are reversed]], and the shattered remnants of XCOM are the ones lurking in the shadows, seeking to overthrow the Earth's corrupt government. Operating out of a new [[AirborneAircraftCarrier mobile headquarters]] fashioned from a [[CoolStarship captured alien transport]], players must rebuild XCOM to fight back against the aliens and free the world from their control before the Elders can achieve [[TheConspiracy their true, sinister goal]]. |
| 12 | |
| 13 | ''XCOM 2'' introduces new gameplay features like procedurally-generated levels, five updated soldier classes, increased soldier customization, more enemy types, and new stealth-based tactics. Most missions put the player under time pressure and you are often expected, if not ''required'' to retreat from a map, making time and manpower as much of a precious resource as dead aliens or loot. Firaxis also included their own content editor and unencrypted code to provide deeper modding support for the community, with several mods commissioned to release on launch day. |
| 14 | |
| 15 | The game was released for PC, Mac and Linux on February 5, 2016, with Xbox One and [=PS4=] ports arriving later on September 6. A Nintendo Switch port was released on May 29, 2020, and came with four DLC packs and the ''War of the Chosen'' expansion, as did the Android port when it was released on July 13, 2021. |
| 16 | |
| 17 | Has an {{Interquel}} novel, "XCOM Resurrection", meant to bridge the gap between the first and second games. |
| 18 | |
| 19 | Like the previous game, ''XCOM 2'' also has a version of the (in)famous ''VideoGame/XCOMLongWar'' mod, ''Long War 2'', which was first released January 19th, 2017. |
| 20 | |
| 21 | A later expansion, ''XCOM 2: War Of The Chosen'', was released in 2017. It features three {{Recurring Boss}}es known as "The Chosen", who adapt to the Commander's tactics. To even the odds, XCOM allies themselves with other resistance movements to unlock new classes. In addition, a neutral enemy faction of [[OurZombiesAreDifferent mutated zombie-like humans known as "the Lost"]] appears on certain missions and can attack both the Resistance and ADVENT. There are also a host of other new mechanics like fatigue and battle bonds. |
| 22 | |
| 23 | One DLC for the ''War of the Chosen'' expansion, called ''XCOM 2: War of the Chosen - Tactical Legacy Pack'', was released on October 9th, 2018. The DLC is a mission pack [[{{Interquel}} taking place between]] ''Enemy Unknown'' and ''XCOM 2'', featuring equipment from the prequel. |
| 24 | |
| 25 | A LighterAndSofter spinoff set five years later, ''[[VideoGame/XCOMChimeraSquad XCOM: Chimera Squad]]'' was released on April 24th, 2020. |
| 26 | |
| 27 | ---- |
| 28 | !!''XCOM 2'' contains examples of: |
| 29 | |
| 30 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 31 | |
| 32 | [[folder:# - C]] |
| 33 | * AbnormalAmmo: |
| 34 | ** Proving Grounds projects allow you to develop all sorts of exotic munitions for use against ADVENT and their alien masters, from [[PoisonedWeapons venom rounds that can poison organic enemies]] to Bluescreen weapons meant to disrupt [[KillerRobot MEC drones]], [[BossInMookClothing Sectopods]], and [[SentryGun Security Turrets.]] |
| 35 | ** The Proving Grounds also allow for the unlock of [[KillItWithFire Incendiary rounds]], Tracer rounds, and Talon rounds, which give a boost to critical chance and critical damage. And also a wide range of [[StuffBlowingUp grenades]], including [[KillItWithFire incendiary]], [[TechnicolorToxin gas]], smoke, and acid grenades. |
| 36 | * ActionSurvivor: The [=VIPs=] in VIP Rescue missions may not be armed, but they're just as capable of climbing pipes and dropping off buildings as your troops, so you don't have to go out of your way and take a ground-only route to accommodate them. |
| 37 | * ActorAllusion: |
| 38 | ** The "Warrior" voice for SPARK is Creator/MichaelDorn aka [[Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration Worf]]. |
| 39 | ** The Resistance Radio DJ, Jake Levy, is voiced by Creator/JakeBusey aka [[Film/StarshipTroopers Private Ace Levy]] |
| 40 | * AdamAndEvePlot: One that XCOM cuts short in the ''Alien Hunter'' DLC. The Viper King is the only male of its species (as the Elders simply mass-clone female Vipers), and established a nest with a few other Vipers and started pumping out offspring [[AmazonBrigade by the dozen]]. Granted, it's not the end of the actual species when you destroy the nest and eliminate the King, as the vast majority of Vipers remain under the rule of ADVENT, but it's the end of the only brood not under the direct control of the Elders. |
| 41 | * AdaptationInducedPlotHole: In ''War Of The Chosen'', if the [=DLCs=] are integrated into the story, it means you do not do the special missions of ''Alien Hunters'' and ''Shen's Last Gift''. This causes a few plot holes: Everyone still treats the Alien Rulers as Vahlen's creations, even though this never comes up in-story. Note that this only applies if you selected the "Integrated DLC" option. not selecting this has you play through the story missions for the DLC like normal. |
| 42 | * TheAIIsACheatingBastard: Supply Raid missions in ''War of the Chosen'' work somewhat similarly to Retaliation missions - a fixed number of neutral objects (supply crates in this case) are spread across the map, and you're in a race against ADVENT to hit as many as you can before they do. This would be frustrating enough by default for a number of reasons, but it gets worse by the fact that, contrary to you, ADVENT doesn't need to move a unit into contact with a crate to mark the thing for retrieval. They simply ''mark'' them, presumably from orbit, two crates per turn, and if you can't reach them in time to re-mark them, they're gone. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]]: you're stealing resources by changing the digital mark on the crates to hide them from ADVENT and mark them for support to pick up later: the aliens don't ''need'' to mark the crates, they just need to activate the marks when they're ready to pick up the supplies. |
| 43 | * AirborneAircraftCarrier: ''[[CoolAirship The Avenger]]'', the XCOM base captured from the aliens, qualifies, as it houses the Skyranger. |
| 44 | * AKA47: Averted by XCOM's standard weapons, but present in the three independent resistance factions. |
| 45 | ** The Reapers' Vektor rifle is clearly based on the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalashnikov_rifle Kalashnikov]] rifle family, more specificially the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragunov_sniper_rifle Dragunov]] sniper rifle. Not only does the gun's famous ruggedness fit the Reapers' survivalist shtick, but their faction hero Outrider's real name is Elena Dragunova, just in case someone missed the hint. |
| 46 | ** The Skirmishers' generically-named Bullpup rifle appears to be inspired by the Israeli [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IWI_Tavor_X95 Tavor X95]] assault carbine and a few of its predecessor models. |
| 47 | ** The Templars' autopistols strongly resemble the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uzi Uzi]] line of submachine guns, with a side of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MAC-10 MAC-10]] thrown in for flavor. The magnetic version in particular looks a lot like a Micro-Uzi with a rectangular barrel. |
| 48 | * AlienBlood: Of course, seen from wounded aliens. Disturbingly, ADVENT troopers, who are seemingly unaltered humans, bleed orange blood when shot, giving hints to the number of modifications the aliens have already inflicted. During the ADVENT [[MookMaker Forge Facility]] mission [[spoiler: XCOM discovers that ADVENT troops are all [[HalfHumanHybrid alien-human hybrids]] ''grown'' from scratch, using concentrated genetic material from millions of gene-therapy patients that have disappeared since ADVENT's founding.]] |
| 49 | * AlienInvasion: The aliens you fought in ''Enemy Unknown'' invaded the Earth and [[TheBadGuyWins ''won'']]. |
| 50 | * AllDesertsHaveCacti: Missions in desert biomes regardless of global location can have numerous saguaro cacti around that combatants can use for full cover. If destroyed by enemy gunfire, it will still grant a half-cover bonus. |
| 51 | * TheAllegedCar: The ''Avenger'', your CoolAirship base, is a captured alien ship, retrofitted by Lily Shen and her father, but it's not exactly shipshape: there's massive amounts of debris in the non-critical areas that needs to be cleared out, the furniture is best described as "used", and Lily notes that the reactor output has a tendency to drop precipitously under full load, making flying it a difficult proposition. And Bradford is ''not'' a pilot, so everyone complains about his flying. But it's home. |
| 52 | * AllYourBaseAreBelongToUs: |
| 53 | ** ''Avenger'' Defense missions, which throw a great many mechanical limitations out of the window, such as restrictions on wounded soldiers being deployed or the ArbitraryHeadcountLimit. [[JustifiedTrope Of course]], if they get in, it's an instant GameOver, so it's a GodzillaThreshold for the entirety of XCOM. These missions are usually very tough, which makes beating them all the better. |
| 54 | ** The Alien Fortress Assault mission, the final mission of the full game. Since it's the ending of the game, XCOM are willing to pass the GodzillaThreshold to take down [[spoiler:the Ethereals]] once and for all. |
| 55 | * AlphaStrike: |
| 56 | ** Compared to [[VideoGame/XCOMEnemyUnknown the first game]], soldiers in XCOM 2 are master of this, as befitting for guerrilla warfare. Soldiers now start in concealment on most missions, and with little planning, can wipe out the first pod they encounter by attacking out of concealment simultaneously. As the game progresses, you can AlphaStrike harder with new equipment and skills, such as [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill combining Sharpshooter's Killzone with Proximity Mine, and opening the strike with yet another grenade while the rest of the soldiers overwatches]].''War of the Chosen'' gives you universal skill points for successful ambushes, making them even more valuable. However, you shouldn't throw everything you have on Alpha Striking the enemy, because you may need those for enemies in later pods. Estimating how hard you should AlphaStrike is an important skill; too hard means you waste items/skills, too soft means surviving enemies can counterattack. |
| 57 | ** Can also be played on the enemy's side. [[RankScalesWithAsskicking ADVENT Officers can Mark targets, giving Troopers a +20 aim bonus to firing on them]]. |
| 58 | * AlternateTimeline: The game takes place in a timeline where XCOM lost the war [[LesCollaborateurs after being betrayed by the Council]]. In this version of events there was no SortingAlgorithmOfEvil and the aliens brought their A-game immediately, destroying France in a terror attack [[CurbStompBattle two months in before XCOM even developed lasers]] and prompting Earth to surrender. |
| 59 | ** Certain background conversations regarding the 2015 invasion as being the absolute first time X-Com ever encountered the aliens seem to rule out the main games as taking place in the same continuity as ''VideoGame/TheBureauXCOMDeclassified'' (though these characters may simply be misinformed, given the lengths the 1950's version of X-Com went through to erase all evidence of that invasion, as well as some background text in ''Enemy Within'' that does suggest that ''The Bureau'' occurred in the same timeline). |
| 60 | * AlwaysAccurateAttack: There are a few attacks that always have 100% hit chance, and will only miss in special circumstances. All of these attacks (if available) are crucial in the early game, when missed shots hurt the most. |
| 61 | ** Launching or throwing a grenade will always lead to it hitting all targets in the blast radius, unless it's improperly aimed or the enemy is immune to explosives (i.e. [[BigBad the Chosen)]]. |
| 62 | ** Combat Protocol, in which the Specialist's GREMLIN drone flies over and zaps an enemy. It has two charges per mission, and the damage is pitiful unless the enemy's a robot. |
| 63 | ** "Hail of Bullets" is a standard shot with no crit chance. It consumes 3 ammo points (equal to a Cannon's entire base magazine) and has a lengthy cooldown. |
| 64 | ** "Shadowfall" is a once-per-mission shot with the Shadowkeeper flintlock pistol. If it's a killshot, it conceals the wielder. The beginning model only does [[CherryTapping 2 damage]], which can be increased with the magnetic and plasma upgrades as well as pistol breakthroughs in Research. |
| 65 | ** The basic skill of a Templar, "Rend", can't miss. It triggers Momentum, an extra action that can be spent on an extra move or the "Parry" skill where the first damage-dealing attack is nullified. If the Templar is lucky enough to have it available, Bladestorm reaction strikes are just as accurate as Rend. |
| 66 | ** The Assassin's {{katana|sAreJustBetter}} cannot miss a swing at all, even the Overwatch-like reaction slashes from Bladestorm. It also [[ArmorPiercingAttack ignores up to five points of armor]] and [[NoSavingThrow can't be dodged]]. |
| 67 | * AndTheAdventureContinues: The story ends with [[spoiler:the entire human race rioting and rebelling against ADVENT, ADVENT disorganized and suffering casualties but far from finished, and XCOM/resistance forces broadcasting to rebels to hold their ground, promising that help is on the way. Meanwhile, a hostile psionic aura is seeping through cracks in the ocean floor. ''War of the Chosen'' expands on this, with Geist and his Templars preparing to face the new threat, which is apparently ''cracking the ocean''.]] |
| 68 | -->[[spoiler: '''Geist:''' We won but a battle... now the real war begins.]] |
| 69 | * AndThereWasMuchRejoicing: [[spoiler:Once word gets out that the research team discovered the Ethereals ruling the aliens and responsible for the invasion of Earth are dying out everyone on the Avenger starts celebrating. Then they find out [[OhCrap what the Ethereals are doing to prolong their lives]].]] |
| 70 | * AndYourRewardIsClothes: Completing the Tactical Legacy Missions rewards you with new weapon skins, new armor and helmet customization options, and new soldier "attitudes". [[spoiler:Done somewhat more literally with the end of Operation: Lazarus, where you rescue Bradford's sweater from ''Enemy Unknown''.]] |
| 71 | * AntiArmor: There are a number of attacks that "shred" armor, permanently reducing the target's armor value by an amount that depends on the type and tier of the weapon used. The Grenadier's squaddie-level skill Shredder is the most reliable example and borderline mandatory from mid-game onwards when armored enemies appear more and more frequently. Others include all sorts of [[StuffBlowingUp grenades]] and, unfortunately, alien plasma guns like the rifle that Mutons wield, so you'll (usually) end up on the receiving end of this at least as often as you dish it out whenever the AI decides to chuck a grenade at you. |
| 72 | * AntiFrustrationFeatures: |
| 73 | ** When you encounter alien rulers in normal missions, they will run away and leave the mission after losing about 30% of their health bar, without regaining their lost health and armor the next time you encounter them. This is very helpful since it's nearly impossible to kill a full health alien ruler without taking casualties. |
| 74 | ** Alien rulers and the chosen never show up together in the same missions. |
| 75 | ** As with the previous game, if the player fails to complete any critical mission where failure results in losing the campaign, he will be given a chance to restart the level, even if playing on ironman difficulty. Unfortunately this does not apply to Chosen Stronghold missions, since the game will not end if you fail them. |
| 76 | ** Instead of individually producing upgraded weapons, you now pay a flat fee for everyone to upgrade to the next tier. In addition, if a weapon has been modified to improve its aim, damage, etc., those modifications will be transferred to a weapon of the new tier, instead of forcing the player to continue using the old weapon or lose the mods. |
| 77 | ** Also, reloading a soldier's primary weapon costs them an action point, but does ''not'' end their turn as it did in the previous game. This saves you the trouble (and a good amount of resources) to upgrade everyone's pistol to the next weapon tier, and it spares you the awkward choice between "Waste a turn, and possibly this soldier's life, reloading" or "Draw an obsolete pistol and fire for ridiculously low damage (and still have an empty primary weapon next turn)". |
| 78 | ** If all other aliens in a Retaliation mission are killed, any Faceless hiding among the civilians will reveal themselves, so you don't have to hunt them down. |
| 79 | ** In a mission that requires you to neutralize all enemies, if you hack an AI unit or mind control an alien and kill all other aliens, the mission ends successfully without requiring you to gun down the controlled unit (even though you will lose control of the controlled unit). |
| 80 | ** The mission will also end if only turrets remain on the map. |
| 81 | ** Additionally, unlike the original you can directly target hacked or mind controlled enemies in order to gun them down before they break free rather than having to wait until they leave your control or using explosives (of course, [[VideoGameCrueltyPotential having them drop a grenade at their own feet is still a viable and fun tactic]], and can be even helpful if there are [[HoistByHisOwnPetard other enemies in the blast radius.]] |
| 82 | ** The UI puts an icon next to enemies when you move one of your characters, letting you know who that character can see from his potential destination BEFORE you decide to move, allowing the player to make more informed decisions and not move a character and find only too late he has no line of sight on a potential target. ''War of the Chosen'' expanded this: holding ALT on a movement space allows you to see exactly what enemies the character will be able to see at the new position. |
| 83 | ** Rather than requiring players to use the Experimental Ammo and Experimental Grenade projects to roll randomly for the strategically important Bluescreen Rounds and EMP grenades, you just need to complete one project for both before being able to mass produce them. This is good, because some of the game's scariest enemies are highly vulnerable to these equipment options. |
| 84 | ** For some important missions such as Avenger defense and the final level, where you can't actually wait for wounded soldiers to recover, the game will allow you to deploy injured soldiers to the field. However, wounded soldiers deployed this way will start slightly damaged, and in ''War of the Chosen'', tired. |
| 85 | ** On "Protect the data tap" missions, while the game will spawn enemies within firing range of the data tap on turn 1, the alien pods will never use ''all'' their available attacks on the data tap each turns, guaranteeing that the player has enough time to reach and engage them and not lose the mission on turn one or two (generally, only one pod will actually attack per turn as well). They will also prioritize shooting your soldiers when they are in range, over further damaging the data tap (generally speaking). |
| 86 | ** You are still granted loot rewards if there are any still on the ground when you complete a mission that doesn't require your troop to do an evac to win, even if no unit is physically capable of reaching it before it self destructs. |
| 87 | ** You can go straight to the workshop to buy or build items from the mission loadout screen without cancelling the deployment. Just in case you just realized that the last set of Bluescreen ammo you had was on the Grenadier you lost last mission. |
| 88 | ** Aliens will only ever ''purposely'' kill one civilian a turn in Retaliation missions to keep things from being blatantly unfair. However, if they miss a shot at a civilian, it won't stop them from trying again until they succeed or run out of attacks, nor will it stop civilians from triggering overwatch. Still better than a true civilian slaughter, though. |
| 89 | *** ''War of the Chosen'' nullifies this, because the game occasionally spawns special ADVENT pods in Retaliation missions that ignore XCOM units to kill as many civilians as possible instead. It's not uncommon to watch them gun down 3-4 civilians in one turn while being being unable to do anything about it. They're so frustrating that Central actively points them out when they appear. |
| 90 | ---->'''Central:''' Commander, ADVENT isn't backing down, they've got units in the AO that are ignoring our units just to get a better shot at the civilians. Take those bastards down! |
| 91 | ** The Evac command is a free action, meaning it can be used after dashing. Quite helpful on forced extraction missions, since predetermined Evac points rarely have good cover. |
| 92 | ** If a predetermined Evac point is no longer viable (i.e. it was on a rooftop and [[EverythingBreaks that rooftop no longer exists]]), Central will call in a new one for you. Unfortunately, sometimes the Evac point is [[NiceJobBreakingItHero too far away from the main objective]]... |
| 93 | ** Codex aliens are immune to damage over time effects from fire, acid, or poison. This may seem frustrating, but since a Codex spawns a clone every time it gets hurt, it will prevent the commander from being [[ZergRush swamped in Codex duplicates]]. |
| 94 | ** Overwatch shots slow time and take a moment to give a cinematic view of the action, but multiple soldiers and certain abilities like Kill Zone would result in a rather long break in gameplay as each person slowly fires at each alien individually. Fortunately, once 3 or four aliens have been shot at, the game expedites the process, returning to normal gameplay with the aliens' damage applied offscreen. |
| 95 | ** Also on Overwatch, any damage dealt breaks Overwatch, unlike in the previous game where you had to Suppress, flashbang (hence worthless against mechanical foes), outright kill or use a soldier with Lightning Reflexes to spring it. While this can benefit the aliens sometimes, it's far more to XCOM's advantage. |
| 96 | ** Unfortunately averted with the Alien Hunter DLC weapons. If a unit carrying one of the 4 weapons is killed on the field and their body isn't retrieved, the weapon is lost forever. However, you ''are'' warned about this beforehand. |
| 97 | ** However, "Ruler" alien corpses from the Alien Hunter DLC will ''always'' be recovered, regardless if the mission normally allows for it regularly or not. This is to prevent PermanentlyMissableContent from occurring and guarantee players can always research the Ruler Armors, in case the Rulers randomly appear on a mission which requires the squad to escape via an EVAC zone. |
| 98 | ** Similar to the above, any plot-critical corpses like [[spoiler: the first codex you encounter by Skulljacking an Officer, and the Avatar you fight once you Skulljack a Codex]] will be extracted regardless of the mission type. |
| 99 | ** Skulljacking has a flat 70% chance to hit that can't be improved by bonuses to aim. Fortunately, unlike going for a melee attack with swords or Strike, if your soldier fails to do a Skulljack, she gets a move refunded to her so you can either shoot the ADVENT soldier in the face or beat a hasty retreat. The Skulljack will also succeed whenever doing so would fulfill a current objective, so despite showing the 70% figure, it will never fail [[spoiler: the first time you use it on an Advent Officer or a Codex]]. |
| 100 | ** Hacking enemies (yes, including Skulljacks) and sentry posts penalizes the soldier if they fail. Any mission-critical hacking objectives like chests or cells ''cannot'' fail outright; you can only fail to get the bonus reward. |
| 101 | ** In addition, you are ''never'' required to hack a target with a failure chance: if you start a hack request and don't like your odds, then you can back out without any penalty. |
| 102 | *** This can actually work in some players' favor if the bonus reward is good and there are almost no other enemies left on the map. Even if the hack fails and ADVENT sends enemies to their position, it's more like [[NiceJobFixingItVillain free XP for XCOM soldiers]]. And if it succeeds? Bonus. |
| 103 | ** ''War of The Chosen'' includes several new campaign options, such as increasing the turn limit on Resistance missions, and making the Avatar project take longer, giving players a lot more breathing room on the battlefield and world map. |
| 104 | ** Also in ''War of the Chosen'', when one of the titular Chosen shows up to play, most [[TimedMission running mission timers]] will [[TakeYourTime pause until they're gone]]. However, the clock only stops when you actually engage the chosen, not merely when they show up. This is a real problem when dealing with the warlock, since he'll constantly harass you with spectral zombies until you make visual contact with him, forcing you to waste action points and turns gunning them down until then. |
| 105 | ** The Chosen prioritize stunning your soldiers so they can interrogate them. However, they will never interrogate a soldier on the same turn that the soldier gets stunned, even if they have the movement/ability to do so. In addition, reviving a stunned soldier just requires you to stand next to them, and that soldier then immediately gets their action points back. |
| 106 | ** The Fatigue mechanic forces you to rotate your soldiers. This is normally annoying, but, if you're playing on Ironman difficulty, it also makes it less likely that all of your favourites will be killed off in one go if a mission goes wrong. Also you can use a tired soldier on a mission without any disadvantages from fatigue by equipping him with a mind shield. |
| 107 | ** If one of the faction heroes in War of the Chosen (Templar, Skirmisher, or Reaper) is killed, you'll receive a covert operation after the next supply drop to get another one. Better yet, the new one you get will be at a similar rank to the one you lost, so you won't have to spend a dozen gameplay hours getting him ranked back up to par with the rest of your team. |
| 108 | * AppliedPhlebotinum: Psionics. Whatever the plot needs to progress, psionics has got it covered. Mind control, reviving the dead both on and off the battlefield, teleportation, summoning all kinds of things like {{Energy Being}}s, energy beams, multi-purpose energy vortices and more, powering a planetwide communications network, transferring a consciousness into a(nother) physical body, ... It's probably easier to list the things psionics ''can't'' do. It helps that, unlike in the original game, the aliens have a massive, technologically-supported "psionic network" that boosts the power of anyone with the right hardware. [[spoiler: But that means XCOM can hack it.]] |
| 109 | * ArbitraryHeadcountLimit: |
| 110 | ** The squad size is limited to 4, upgradable to up to 6. No reason is ever really given for it, as the Skyranger visibly has 6 seats from the get-go (and would logically have more than 6, based on some of the VIP rescue missions and retaliation missions). Not to mention there's clearly enough room for troops to sit on the floor even if there are no seats (that may be uncomfortable, but for getting extra men it would be an acceptable inconvenience) Averted in Avenger defense missions which you will always start with 6 even without upgrade, and you will keep receiving more after a number of turns have passed, starting from the highest ranked ones. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] because they are some of the hardest levels. |
| 111 | ** One achievement requires you to complete a campaign on Commander+ difficulty without ever purchasing squad size upgrades, thus limiting you to four operatives. If certain faction orders are active, you can even have an extra XCOM rookie (Volunteer Army) or ADVENT Trooper/Stun Lancer (Double Agent) join your squad. |
| 112 | * ArbitraryMissionRestriction: |
| 113 | ** The penultimate story mission cuts your allowed squad size down to three, with a semi-random option to add a fourth operative for a nominal price in intel, due to incredibly high surveillance [[spoiler: on the ADVENT main network tower]]. |
| 114 | ** ''War of the Chosen'' starts with a mission that splits your force into two two-man teams, accompanied by one of the new faction heroes for a sum total of three fighters each. They do reunite for the mission's final battle, but actually getting there is a whole new exercise when you're used to 4-6 operatives at any time. |
| 115 | ** [=WotC=] side missions may also spawn with Sitreps that impose various restrictions, like allowing only soldiers of sergeant rank or lower to participate, which can get really nasty if you took care to keep all your teams on roughly the same rank and therefore have only one or two eligible team members. |
| 116 | * ArchaicWeaponForAnAdvancedAge: Of course there's the basic sword in the vanilla game, a low-tech solution for a world beset by aliens with plasma guns. However, the ''Alien Hunter'' DLC turns this trope up to (18)11. The Bolt Caster is a mechanized crossbow with a single shot, the Hunter's Axe [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin is a high-quality axe]], and the Shadowkeeper is a flintlock pistol that appears to be firing grapeshot. Somehow, these unique pieces of equipment are simply ''better'' than modern hardware, either being more damaging and/or having useful abilities, and you can further upgrade them to EnhancedArchaicWeapon status so they'll remain at the top. In War of the Chosen, the [[AffablyEvil Hunter]] will even joke about it if you miss a shot at him with the Bolt Caster, even if it's upgraded. |
| 117 | -->'''Hunter:''' [[DeadpanSnarker Where did you dig that thing up? It looks older than you.]] |
| 118 | * ArmCannon: Heavy weapons are mounted on the left forearm of EXO or WAR suits. Same goes for the light armors' grappling hook as a non-lethal example. |
| 119 | * ArmorIsUseless: ZigZagged. The basic Kevlar Armor doesn't provide ''any'' bonus at all -- not even the token 1 hit point it gave in the first game. This is because ''all'' damage requires healing in ''2'', unlike in ''Enemy Unknown'', where healing was only necessary when damage exceeded [[BodyArmorAsHitPoints the hit points provided by armor]]. Kevlar is set at +0 HP to provide a baseline comparing other armor, but the actual starting amount of health is the same, with Rookies wearing Kevlar having 1 hit point more than civilians who lack any armor. To drive the point home, one of the cosmetic options for light armor introduced in the ''Anarchy's Children'' DLC is ''no armor at all.'' Your troops can go into combat shirtless and wearing hot pants, and it will afford them the same protection as Kevlar armor.\ |
| 120 | On the other hand, all of the armors that ''do'' provide a health bonus are quite sturdy-looking and cover up much of the body; tier 3 armor covers the wearer's entire body from collar to toe, including the whole hands. |
| 121 | * ArmorPiercingAttack: Quite a few of them, actually. |
| 122 | ** All explosive-based grenades[[note]]Frag Grenades, Plasma Grenades, Acid Grenades, and the like[[/note]] shred armor and deal guaranteed damage. They'll shred even a Chosen with Blast Shield. |
| 123 | ** [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin AP rounds]] ignore up to five armor pips, so only the most heavily armored enemies in the game (namely, Gatekeepers with their shell closed) can put up any resistance to it. A Sharpshooter with [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill Fan Fire equipped with AP rounds can generally reduce everything in range to hunks of flesh]]. |
| 124 | ** Offensive psionics generally deal full damage regardless of any armor stat the target might have. |
| 125 | ** The Hunter's Darkclaw pistol comes pre-equipped with the effect of AP ammo as part of its InfinityPlusOneSword package. |
| 126 | ** The Lost's melee attacks ignore armor, although that's actually a side effect of how the game handles armor penetration. Lost attacks don't have an innate piercing stat, but they deal exactly one point of ScratchDamage. Since any successful hit always inflicts at least one point of damage, armor doesn't help against their DeathOfAThousandCuts. |
| 127 | ** Poison and gas of any kind rip straight through armor because, unfortunately in this case, helmets are cosmetic items that don't provide additional protection against hazards like these, and there's no sealed armor like in the prequel. Fortunately, there's the Hazmat Vest to take care of that, and any soldiers carrying a Medikit are also immune to poison. |
| 128 | ** EMP Grenades/Bombs and Bluescreen Rounds ignore armor on enemies that are susceptible to them, which are, coincidentally, some of the most heavily armored and scary enemies in the game. |
| 129 | * ArtificialBrilliance: |
| 130 | ** Enemies are divided into Leaders and Followers. If a Follower is the sole survivor of its pod, it will flee and join the pod of the closest Leader (provided it survives). |
| 131 | ** The game draws a line between your squad's average position and the mission's objective. If you go too long without seeing any aliens, the other pods will make a beeline to that line in order to catch you. This has the unfortunate side effect of [[StealthRun totally stealthy missions]] being all but impossible to achieve; as with most cases, certain gameplay mods do away with this behavior in favor of entirely random patrols. |
| 132 | * ArtificialStupidity: |
| 133 | ** ADVENT Troopers have been sighted making questionable tactical choices during firefights, such as taking cover behind a burning vehicle that was [[EveryCarIsAPinto about to explode]]. This is justifiable by Tygan's in-game mention that removing the Commander from the alien's psionic network as part of Operation Gatecrasher has caused the ADVENT tactical data to degrade. |
| 134 | ** Sectoids tend to favor using their psychic powers, even when using their pistol would be far more advantageous to them and they are flanking an enemy. In particular since two of their powers don't have any direct effect until their next turn - raising a dead unit as a zombie, the zombie can't act on the turn it's raised, while mind-controlled units similarly can't act until the next enemy turn, this can be a waste of an opportunity. Both actions also end the sectoid's turn, and their effects end if it is killed. The third power induces panic in a unit, but panicked units are liable to just immediately turn around and [[NiceJobFixingItVillain ''shoot the sectoid'']]. |
| 135 | ** Spectres from ''War of the Chosen'' have a similar problem, they nearly always go straight for Shadowbound attack if they can but neither the Spectre or the shadow clone can attack that turn and the rest of the XCOM forces can just kill the Spectre on their go which kills both of them[[note]]if the clone doesn't have a sustain ability[[/note]] before either of them can do any damage. |
| 136 | ** Similarly, Vipers love to use their bind-and-crush move rather than shooting, which does take a soldier out of action, but only inflicts 2 damage per turn while in effect and can actually serve as protection during the enemy turn since no other enemy can target a soldier while they are bound. All it takes is a single hit from anything to break the viper's bind effect, leaving the solider he was binding right next to him with all his action points for an easy point blank kill shot. |
| 137 | ** Same with the Codices. Their usual first action is a teleport and then an AOE vortex that drains all ammo of the affected subjects within. The teleport usually ends them flanking one or more of the XCOM soldiers so why they don't just shoot them dead is a mystery. It should be noted that the vortex will also implode on the enemy's next turn, dealing huge damage to anything stupid enough to either stick around or wander into the area. This turns interesting when the Codex's second ability, giving up half of it's remaining health to a clone when it takes damage, is ''also'' typically used to flank your troops by just spawning another Codex near them. In tight enough spaces, such as on rooftops, the Codex can, and more often than not will, drop its clone right in the middle of ''it's own attack'', turning an otherwise extremely dangerous CastFromHitpoints ability into an assisted suicide. |
| 138 | ** Sectopods and Gatekeepers don't bother moving around obstacles in their path...they just stomp through. No matter what that obstacle might be. And some obstacles in the game do bad things when damaged. It's not uncommon to suddenly see a message during the alien turn that a Sectopod somewhere on the map which hasn't been uncovered yet has stepped into a chemical tank and is now getting its armor melted off by HollywoodAcid. |
| 139 | ** Even if their reckless environmental destruction doesn't directly damage them, it can still be detrimental to their cause, like when a Sectopod/Gatekeeper stationed inside a UFO walks over and [[NiceJobFixingItVillain destroys the distress beacon it's supposed to protect]]. It can also backfire on you if the thing it just accidentally stomped flat was the data access point or loot chest you were supposed to capture. |
| 140 | ** Gatekeepers don't care about civilian casualties when they unleash their [[HerdHittingAttack Gateway]] attack... even if the VIP they're supposed to protect [[OneHitKill gets caught in the blast]]. Unfortunately, this means that XCOM only gets some extra supplies instead of Intel and supplies if they complete the mission. |
| 141 | ** The Holy Warrior psychic power boosts the stats of a unit, at the cost of killing ''both'' units if the unit casting Holy Warrior dies. ADVENT Priests with 1 health point will gleefully cast Holy Warrior on full-health Archons and Gatekeepers, allowing you to nuke them both by gently [[ScratchDamage poking the Priest with a pistol.]] |
| 142 | ** [[KillItWithFire Purifiers]], [[PurpleIsPowerful Priests]] and [[SnakesAreSexy Vipers]] are not very bright at the best of times, and have no problems wasting their attacks on units that are immune to them. They'll quite happily try to set your fireproof [=SPARK=] units on fire, spit poison clouds at your medics [[NoSell (who can't be poisoned, as simply carrying a medkit grants poison immunity)]] or try to mind control units in the middle of a solace field. Vipers, and all other types of melee-heavy enemies for that matter, also have a hilarious preference for attacking (or moving past) Bladestorm-Rangers that can instakill them right back, even when there are other XCOM operatives nearby that would make easier targets. |
| 143 | ** Retaliation missions in ''War of the Chosen'' have been changed to include groups of enemy resistance fighters along with the unarmed civilians you're trying to protect, who will shoot at whatever alien attackers are nearby. The thing is, though, while enemy pods will still move around the map shooting any human they see, they still won't formally ''activate'' until they enter line of sight of ''your'' soldiers- meaning they won't even attempt to take cover from the resistance soldiers, who will blithely gun the aliens down as they stand cluelessly out in the open before your guys even arrive to reinforce them. Even the resistance soldiers' weak rifles (weaker than even your basic starting assault rifles) will still bring down basic enemy troopers quite effectively when they're hitting virtually every shot. |
| 144 | ** Void Rift is a Psionic area of effect spell which does middling damage twice: once when you cast it, and again when the area collapses. Alien units which don't leave the area might be stunned, but aliens which wander into the area have no such excuse. |
| 145 | ** It's not uncommon for enemies with AOE attacks to use them [[UnfriendlyFire against their own troops]]. In particular, Gatekeepers and Sectopods will gleefully spam Gateways and Lightning Fields to get more zombies and fry enemy troops respectively, even if their allies are in the radius. |
| 146 | * ArtisticLicenseBiology: In the scene where the Commander's brain chip is removed, going from the mouth to the occipital lobe without running into the brain stem or anything else along the way. |
| 147 | * AscendedMeme: |
| 148 | ** Vahlen [[https://www.reddit.com/r/Xcom/comments/7577u7/official_remix_commander_you_may_want_to_instruct/ really,]] [[https://www.reddit.com/r/Xcom/comments/758de8/advent_vahlen_canon_now/ really]] wants the men to exercise restraint when using explosives. [[https://youtu.be/iA0nIRE4u2o And now there are]] [[https://youtu.be/vGxb4XgOopk two official dance remixes]]. |
| 149 | ** Peter van Doorn, NPC from the first game who became recruitable in ''[[VideoGame/XCOMLongWar Long War]]'' mod, appears here as one of the Hero Units. There's also a random quote by Bradford on the Geoscape: |
| 150 | --->'''Bradford:''' We're picking up an unsecured transmission from some clown calling himself Van Doorn... doesn't sound like the type of recruit we're looking for. |
| 151 | ** Sometimes, [[http://i.imgur.com/NdKXjoj.png Bradford misses his old sweater]]. In the ''Tactical Legacy Pack'' DLC's mini campaigns, [[spoiler:the final mission has your squad breaking into an ADVENT stronghold to recover a powerful artifact that the aliens had recovered from the XCOM base. This artifact turns out to be John Bradford's famous sweater.]] |
| 152 | * AttackAttackAttack: Lancers and Berserkers are prone to this, going to attack in melee no matter how suicidal it is to do so. The Lancers actually have guns, but they only use them if no potential melee targets are in range, or if they can't use their Lance (i.e. they're on [[IncendiaryExponent fire]], [[BlindedByTheLight blinded]], poisoned, etc.) |
| 153 | * AttackFailureChance: The Dodge mechanic that applies to several enemies, as well as XCOM soldiers with the right gear. Dodge is a percent chance that isn't shown to the player, takes priority over {{Critical Hit}}s, and enemies that Dodge take partial damage from the attack with the message "Dodge-Grazed" appearing when the damage pops up. The 1.0 version of the game allowed this to happen even on shots that had a 100% chance to be hit. |
| 154 | * AttackItsWeakPoint: In ''War of the Chosen'', if you allow one of their Knowledge bars to reach maximum, they'll pay the Avenger a visit with an artillery cannon. You can't destroy the cannon itself - you'll have to destroy the generator instead. |
| 155 | * AttentionDeficitOohShiny: The [[GetOutOfJailFreeCard Mimic Beacon]], which attracts [[AlphaStrike every single enemy in the area to it]]. Doesn't matter if it's a Stun Lancer about to [[ShockAndAwe knock one of your troops unconscious]], or a Viper about to [[YouWillNotEvadeMe bind and crush one of your troops]]. Put down a mimic beacon and watch as the aliens [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill go to town on it]]. The only alien that doesn't attack the Mimic Beacon is the Faceless. |
| 156 | ** The Mimic Beacon has a fixed 12 HP, meaning that in the early game levels, the Mimic Beacon could make the difference between winning and losing the game. Keep in mind that your soldiers in early levels have between 5-8 HP. |
| 157 | ** It's even better with Mimic Beacon''s'' (plural), because you can easily get out of a spot by deploying one. For this reason, don't move the soldier with the Mimic Beacon until everyone else has taken their turn. |
| 158 | * AwesomeButImpractical: |
| 159 | ** Ranger melee attacks in general are problematic. Going toe to toe with the aliens and slashing them in half is ''awesome''... but you won't see it happen a lot during the mid- and lategame. Sword damage doesn't scale well with enemy health and armor, so melee kills will be rare, unless you soften the aliens up first. On the other hand, a shotgun blast can usually take care of most enemies, especially if you attached a laser sight (lots of extra crit chance at close range) to said shotgun. Making matters even more difficult, enemy pods normally only become active upon ''seeing'' one of the player's units... and dashing up to perform a melee attack has a decent chance of bringing your attacker into the sight of another group, who will then join in against you[[note]]The advantages of swords are movement and a much higher hit chance than a shotgun: you can dash and still attack with a sword, which you can't do with a shotgun until Lieutenant rank Run & Gun. ''War of the Chosen'' also makes swords much more viable: a random breakthrough can give you a permanent damage boost to all blades, making them on par with rifles, and Blademaster abilities can guarantee a hit, allow you to take attacks against anything that moves near you, and more. With the Chosen Katana, you also get a blade as powerful as a shotgun, that can't miss and ''ignores armor'', making it devastatingly effective[[/note]]. |
| 160 | ** On the other hand, the Ranger's concealment branch doesn't fare much better. A lot of its abilities rely heavily on concealment, which only happens by default at the start of most missions. A Ranger with Phantom can remain undetected, but may become TooAwesomeToUse given the limited chances for concealment. Meanwhile, the Blademaster skills can be used all the time, any time. |
| 161 | ** Hacking nodes can reap all sorts of benefits, such as giving your squad extra turns, disorienting all enemies, taking control of a random foe, and so on. The problem is that more often than not, the penalties for failing a hack are severe; an immediate call for reinforcements or a permanent boost to every alien's defense can easily lead to a failed mission, particularly if it's timed. Unless you're not averse to SaveScumming, or have a Specialist with a very high Tech score above 140+, hacking is usually too risky a venture to pursue. |
| 162 | *** You can still try for a hack when almost all the enemies are killed - if there are only a few who may be too weak anyway, it may be worth it to try to get the hack bonus. |
| 163 | ** Certain ''War of the Chosen'' resistance orders and geoscape perks confer a chance that a resistance fighter (a basic rookie for all intents and purposes) and/or a [[FaceHeelTurn random ADVENT unit]] joins your team for any given mission. While one or two additional guns are always welcome, their wielders are on the lowest end of your troops' combat capability scale. Their short movement range means they'll inevitably fall behind higher-level operatives and may well spend the whole mission just trying to catch up without ever getting a shot off. If they do manage to fire their weapon, they'll rarely hit anything. However, the worst part is that they count as full members of your squad, meaning you ''have'' to extract them along with your own troops (which can cost you the mission because the guys are so damn slow), and if they get wounded or even killed, you can kiss your Flawless rating and your EverybodyLives statistic goodbye. Your operatives might also panic or even pick up negative traits just from watching the help bite the dust, unless they are higher levels. |
| 164 | ** The Resistance soldier (Skirmishers, Reapers and Templars) are certainly very powerful troops- the issue is that they're ''very hard to acquire.'' Aside from the complementary one you get for making contact with each faction (which will be Mox and Outrider if you do Operation Lost and Abandoned), the only way to get another is to complete a Covert Action to recruit them- and these are not only completely random, they don't even appear as an option very often at all. This also makes them very hard to replace if you lose your starter soldier. Given this, investing in upgrading them can be a very risky endeavour as you may end up spending tons of resources[[note]]although fortunately weapon upgrades for Resistance soldiers ''are'' cheaper than for your core classes[[/note]] upgrading equipment for only a single soldier, only to find yourself without any units of that soldier left and no opportunity to replace them. A [[DownplayedTrope downplayed example]] as the ones you do get are still extremely powerful, often enough to justify the risk and expense if you're careful with them, and if you ''are'' lucky enough to get extra soldiers, they can change the game. |
| 165 | ** The Colonel rank healing power for Specialist, Restoration, is very powerful, being a one-use-per-mission full team heal. However, it's ''only'' one use per mission, and it's rare that you'll be in a position where you need to heal ''everyone'' on the same turn. While lower-rank Specialist heal abilities are the definition of BoringButPractical, Restoration is much, much more situational. Not helping is the fact that the other Colonel rank ability, Capacitor Discharge, has much more utility. |
| 166 | * BadassBoast: In the ''War of the Chosen'' expansion one of the new features includes the ability to make propaganda posters featuring your soldiers with slogans like "[name] Advent's leading cause of death." |
| 167 | * TheBadGuyWins: ''XCOM 2'' takes place in an alternate timeline after XCOM failed to stop the invasion, and aliens took complete control of the planet. |
| 168 | * BagOfSpilling: You lose all the upgrades and tech from ''Enemy Unknown'', as in this timeline world leaders surrendered before XCOM ever got their hands on it. |
| 169 | * BaitAndSwitch: The tutorial section of the game delays the introduction of Chief Engineer Shen until after the second tutorial mission; by that time, Shen has been mentioned multiple times, but always carefully worded so that a player who is familiar with ''Enemy Unknown'' (and hasn't seen anything in advance about this game's characters) is encouraged to assume that it's the same Dr. Shen who served under the Commander as chief engineer of XCOM in the earlier game, an assumption that's strengthened by the presence of Bradford in his old XCOM role. During this time, Lily appears on screen several times without being identified, and when she speaks over the comm during the first tutorial mission her comm feed is labelled only "Avenger". After the second tutorial mission, the Commander is finally introduced properly to Chief Engineer Lily Shen, who explains that she's Dr. Shen's daughter, and their first conversation suggests that the Commander had made the same assumption. |
| 170 | * BaitAndSwitchGunshot: [[spoiler:In ''War of the Chosen'', the mission where XCOM is trying to make peace between the Reapers and the Skirmishers, there's a part in one cutscene where it looks like Elena, the Reapers' representative, is about to shoot Mox, the Skirmishers' representative. The shot is then revealed to be for the Chosen Assassin, who was standing right behind Mox. After narrowly dodging the shot and deflecting Mox's grappling hook, she angrily says, "No one has ever done that before. No one shall ever do that again."]] |
| 171 | * BeamOWar: [[spoiler: The commander's Avatar and the remaining Ethereal's spirits get in one briefly before the Commander overpowers and destroys them.]] |
| 172 | * BeefGate: Story missions have certain enemies guaranteed to spawn in them, and while this might not seem so bad with the very first one (the Blacksite's turrets), it ''very'' quickly escalates with the ADVENT Forge (which spawns ''[[BossInMookClothing a sectopod]]'') and the Codex Origin (spawning a gatekeeper and chryssalids) to keep the player from blazing through the game. |
| 173 | * BeyondTheImpossible: If you're shooting a sniper rifle at a large and close enemy, your soldiers can fire a shot while their gun barrel is touching the enemy *and still miss*. |
| 174 | * BenevolentArchitecture: No matter whether it's an ADVENT-controlled city, a resistance haven or the wilderness, there will always be pipes, thick vines or something that your troops can climb to reach higher positions, and even more objects to take cover behind strewn across the area. |
| 175 | * {{BFG}}: |
| 176 | ** Most of XCOM's weapons are either huge, bulky, or both, with the Ranger's various shotguns being the only consistent exceptions. Sniper rifles are almost as long as your Sharpshooters are tall, and Grenadier equipment in general looks like the average human shouldn't be able to even lift it without PoweredArmor support, let alone use it with any degree of accuracy. Alien weapons tend to be more sensibly sized by comparions, which could mean that XCOM's hastily reverse-engineered designs simply haven't been optimized for user comfort yet. |
| 177 | ** If you allow any Chosen's knowledge bar to max out, they'll soon pay the Avenger a visit with a ginormous railway gun as a welcome gift if it's one of their planned activities. This thing is far and away the largest gun in the game, and if you fail to destroy its generator in time, [[NonStandardGameOver you can kiss your mobile base goodbye]]. |
| 178 | * BilingualBonus: Or rather, Pentalingual Bonus. The game offers a multitude of voice sets to customize your soldiers with: three variations of English (American, Australian, British), French, German, Italian and Spanish, usually with ten voices each per gender. The content of their lines is more or less the same, but it adds a nice touch of realism to the MultinationalTeam mechanic, especially since the voice sets are surprisingly well-done. The wording may sound a bit formal at times, but the grammar is accurate and there's hardly any accent audible aside from the intended ones. |
| 179 | * BlindedByTheLight: Returning from [[VideoGame/XComEnemyUnknown XCOM Enemy Within,]] the flashbang grenade is a staple of the early game for hampering foes. This time, it provides the Disoriented effect, providing a similar but smaller debuff to aim (-20, versus -50 in Enemy Within) and a flat -6 to movement range. However, it also provides a debuff to the target's Will, and in stark contrast to the previous game fully affects almost all Psionic enemies, shutting down effects like mind control and psychic reanimation. Still doesn't work on robotic foes, though, and [[GameplayAndStorySegregation don't ask how]] [[GogglesDoNothing the helmet-wearing ADVENT are affected,]] or how the [[MadeOfExplodium Volatile Mix perk lets them deal damage suddenly.]] |
| 180 | * BolivianArmyEnding: [[spoiler: The Informant a.k.a. the Councilman. When ADVENT tracks him down during an emergency transmission at the end of the game, the last we see before the footage cuts out is him shooting it out with the ADVENT troopers kicking down his door.]] |
| 181 | * BoobsAndButtPose: One of the poses your soldiers can take on propaganda posters in the War of the Chosen expansion. [[RuleOfFunny Your male soldiers, too]]. |
| 182 | * {{Bookends}}: |
| 183 | ** [[spoiler: The game begins and ends with news report cinematics. At the beginning, the newscasters are all pro-ADVENT, talking about the upcoming Unification Day celebrations and ADVENT forces arresting "terrorist cells" (X-Com and resistance groups). At the end, the newscasts are mostly Resistance reports about defeating ADVENT and taking in refugees.]] To expand, both the intro and ending cinematics prominently feature an angry, severely outgunned man walking up to an ADVENT checkpoint to provide a distraction for other Resistance forces sneaking up on the bad guys. |
| 184 | ** The tutorial: [[spoiler:Bradford and other agents sneak into an ADVENT area undercover to rescue the Commander.]] The final mission: [[spoiler:XCOM, including the Commander in an Avatar body, invading the alien HQ. There's complementary scenes of Bradford staring down ADVENT troops, and the Commander's Avatar holding back the Ethereals.]] |
| 185 | ** After the Tutorial, [[spoiler: Shen and Tygan remove the Commander from their stasis suit, and Bradford welcomes the Commander back. After the final mission, a cinematic plays: Bradford welcomes the Commander back from their successful mission while removing them from the stasis suit used to control the Avatar.]] |
| 186 | ** Dialogue-wise, the game begins and ends with a high-ranking Resistance member announcing that "now the real war begins". |
| 187 | * BoomHeadshot: |
| 188 | ** Skulljacking. It's a OneHitKill, by the way, assuming it hits. |
| 189 | ** ''War of the Chosen'' adds headshots as a mechanic when dealing with [[OurZombiesAreDifferent The Lost]], which refunds a unit's action if they use it to kill a Lost with a standard attack or a pistol attack. As long as every shot is a kill, one soldier can kill as many Lost in one turn as they have ammo in their gun. One of the Reaper Resistance Orders, "Between the Eyes", guarantees that any shot that hits a Lost will be a kill, allowing pistol Snipers to kill an infinite number of Lost at no ammo or action cost. |
| 190 | * BoringButPractical: |
| 191 | ** Flashbangs deal no damage on their own (barring the soldier launching them having the 'Volatile Mix' ability) and are relatively low-tech, but they have a huge blast radius, don't deal friendly fire, and they disorient non-mechanical aliens, which slows them down by half, kills their aim, breaks overwatch, and prevents them from using their special abilities, some of which can be particularly nasty. Notably, they can instantly free your soldiers from a Sectoid's mind control, prevent Stun-Lancers from using their Melee attack, and prevent Codices from cloning themselves when damaged. |
| 192 | ** The Predator armor. Your first armor upgrade. It applies to your entire fighting force with just one purchase, whereas the other armour types require you to create each individual suit through the Proving Grounds, and allows all your soldiers to carry two utility items. |
| 193 | ** Shredder from the Grenadier tree shreds enemy armor on hit. Against regular troopers with no armor, it may as well not be there. Against heavily armored foes, it becomes a godsend. |
| 194 | ** Vulture from the Guerilla Tactics School. One extra piece of loot every time you kill an enemy that drops loot (and that extra piece will frequently be an Elerium Core). It adds up quite well over time. |
| 195 | ** Squad Size 1+2: improves the ArbitraryHeadcountLimit, permanently, like in the previous game. |
| 196 | ** Wet Work, straightforward EXPBooster that improves by 25% the amount of XP your soldiers gain from kills. |
| 197 | ** Lightning Strike: +3 mobility for 2 turns while you are concealed. Considering how many TimedMission you will go through... |
| 198 | ** Integrated Warfare: improves the PCS (buff items you attach to your soldiers). |
| 199 | ** [[HowDareYouDieOnMe Stay With Me]]: soldiers are more likely to survive losing all of their HP. |
| 200 | ** Inspire gives the targeted soldier one additional action. One more action has countless uses, such as making the difference between a flank shot and a frontal one. |
| 201 | ** Building Radio Relays in contacted provinces. This costs resources, but doubles resource income from that province and reduces the intel cost of contacting neighbouring regions. Building enough relays in a continent gives various bonuses, some of which reduce resource costs and increase income. |
| 202 | ** Bluescreen Rounds (and to a lesser extent EMP grenades): they do no extra damage to organic enemies. Against mechanical enemies, they will ignore armor, inflict extra damage, and make the enemy more vulnerable to hacking. This is useful against MEC Troopers, and ''extremely'' powerful against Sectopods. [[spoiler: And Gatekeepers count as mechanical enemies.]] Bluescreen Rounds are also infinite during a mission. |
| 203 | ** The Rocket Launcher: you get it for free when you design a suit of armor with a heavy weapon slot. It's a one-shot explosive weapon about on par with a plasma grenade, but with better range (though requiring direct line of sight). Other heavy weapons are luck-of-the-draw from heavy weapon development, as you can't choose a particular one to develop, and there isn't a single mission where having a long-range explosion won't be helpful ''somehow''. Other heavy weapons are better but generally more situational, while the Rocket Launcher works in many situations. The Blaster Launcher is just a better version of the Rocket Launcher. |
| 204 | ** The basic ADVENT Trooper is a villainous version of this. All they can do is move, shoot, and Overwatch. No fancy gimmicks of any other enemy. Yet as [[https://xcom.com/xcom-2-stats the official stats page]] shows, that's all they need; Troopers are responsible for the largest number of kills on XCOM troops at a whopping 16% or one-sixth of the total. Adding in the Advanced version, which gives them grenades and some stat boosts but nothing else, accounts for another 8%, making a total of almost one quarter of XCOM losses to these simple foes. |
| 205 | ** Similarly, the official stats page shows that XCOM rookies are responsible for one third of alien deaths, more than any other type of soldier. Move, shoot, throw grenade, overwatch. Job done. |
| 206 | * BossBonanza: Any Chosen you haven't taken down permanently by the time you start the endgame will show up to defend the Elders' headquarters, so if you somehow managed to fail to kill any of them, expect three top-tier {{Boss Battle}}s on top of up to 30 powerful ADVENT units before you even reach the FinalBattle. |
| 207 | * BossInMookClothing: To a lesser extent; Alien units are typically more powerful and drop loot more often than ADVENT troopers. While ADVENT soldiers make up the bulk of the enemies, aliens are elites, usually wielding strange powers. |
| 208 | ** Played completely straight with [[WalkingTank Sectopods]] when they're first introduced. |
| 209 | * BottomlessBladder: You can see (and fight your way through) various houses in the game, including [[spoiler:a glass one in the Alien base]], and they all lack bathrooms. |
| 210 | * BottomlessMagazines: On the XCOM side, the Sharpshooter's pistol can fire a theoretically unlimited number of times in a single turn using the [[GunFu Face Off]] skill, which lets them fire a shot at every visible target once. That said, there's no limit on how many times you reload, as Julian points out if you stick around on the second floor of his DLC map for too long. "Just how many magazines ''did'' you bring along?" And as noted under BoomHeadshot, combining a Sharpshooter's pistol with Between The Eyes lets you kill as many Lost as are in sight and range, which can easily be nearly a dozen. [[BeyondTheImpossible It should be noted the ballistic pistol is a revolver.]] |
| 211 | * BreatherLevel: While all Dark Events are bad, some are significantly less annoying than others. |
| 212 | ** Gone To Ground: The Black Market will be unavailable for 6 weeks. This can be frustrating if you need to sell gear for supplies, or if you need to buy additional gear, but it's far less painful than some events. |
| 213 | ** Vigilance: Enemies have a larger detection radius during Concealment. Since most operations will go loud anyway, this is less of a disadvantage than it seems, only really forcing you to set up your initial ambush from farther away than usual. |
| 214 | ** MidnightRaids: Increases the cost of recruits. Unless you've just lost an entire squad, this is less of a problem than it is a relief when it comes up. In addition, this doesn't affect the random scanning missions that grant free recruits when completed, or Guerilla Ops that reward you with a soldier. |
| 215 | * BuffySpeak: Some XCOM soldier voice sets can dip into this on occasion, like when a soldier picks up some loot dropped by enemies. |
| 216 | -->'''XCOM Operative''' ''[cheerfully]'': I got the... [long [[{{Beat}} beat]]]... thing! |
| 217 | * ButThouMust: At a certain point during the story path, [[spoiler: when you analyze the Codex Brain in the Shadow Chamber]], a UFO will spawn that will always catch the player[[note]]More specifically, the chance of interception is hard-coded at 100%.[[/note]]. Other [=UFOs=] spawned as a result of the "Hunt XCOM" Dark Event have a chance to be evaded.[[note]]The chance starts at 50%. If it is successfully evaded, then the next UFO will have a different chance of interception: 50% on Easy and Normal, 75% on Classic, and 100% on Impossible.[[/note]] |
| 218 | * CallingYourAttacks: XCOM operatives do this quite often when told to use their special abilities, like Grenadiers shouting "Grenade!" or anyone wearing a Spider/Wraith suit announcing "Grappling hook!". |
| 219 | * CameraAbuse: Any autopsy sequence of an organic enemy type will invariably splatter the camera with copious amounts of yellow-orange AlienBlood. Repeatedly. |
| 220 | * CantCatchUp: |
| 221 | ** The Ranger's sword. At the beginning, it is far more accurate than any other weapon and deals more damage, especially with the Blademaster ability. However, with the fact that it cannot be modded, and the higher end powerful enemies exploding upon death, getting close isn't quite worth it toward the end of the game. To make it worse, swords don't get the "Hunter's Instinct" +3 damage bonus on flanked targets unless you [[https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=627968794 mod in a bugfix]], so if you ''can'' get in melee range of an enemy in a single move, the shotgun will be more reliable than the sword. |
| 222 | *** This can be averted if you manage to get your hands on the [[InfinityPlusOneSword Assassin's Katana]] in ''War of the Chosen'', a sword that deals more base damage than any other melee weapon, never misses, ignores armor and almost always crits. |
| 223 | ** The Grenadier's Blast Padding does not scale with armour tier, unlike its counterpart Shredder. Considering how many lategame foes can shred armour, the measly one Armour point it grants won't go far[[note]]Though the damage reduction from explosives gets more important the farther into the game you get[[/note]]. Fortunately, [[http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=657441902 there's also a mod for that.]] |
| 224 | * TheCavalry: For the villains. On certain missions, ADVENT will call in reinforcements against you. |
| 225 | * ChooseAHandicap: Every month, ADVENT begins preparing new "Dark Events" to make your life miserable in various ways, such as equipping all their soldiers with extra armor or placing Faceless infiltrators everywhere. To counter this, every month you can do a Guerilla Ops mission to stop one of these Dark Events to coming to fruition. However, you can't stop every Dark Event before it starts, so you will inevitably have to choose which Dark Events you'll just have to power through. |
| 226 | * CigarChomper: Thanks to the character editor, any XCOM soldier can be one, including Mox and Elena. |
| 227 | * ColorCodedArmies: Downplayed due to the customization of your soldiers and different enemy designs, but XCOM-related stuff is generally blue (The geoscape globe, the interface for things that are friendly, the background behind the Informant) and light grey (mid and late game armors and guns, the Avenger, the Skyranger) , while ADVENT favors red and black (Soldiers, dropships, even the background during their news announcement). |
| 228 | ** This extends to turrets, whose design is the same for the ones built by the enemy and XCOM, except the enemy's have red lights and friendly ones have blue lights. Interestingly, hacking a turret will cause a change in the color but will not alert ADVENT of your presence until it attacks them, while hacking another robotic unit won't produce any visible change, yet will immediately break concealment. |
| 229 | * ColorCodedForYourConvenience: |
| 230 | ** The general tasks of ADVENT troops are easy to discern by the color of their armor. Front-line grunts like [[BoringButPractical Troopers]] and [[TheBerserker Stun Lancers]] wear black, [[MookCommander Officers]] are red (and very rarely golden), specialists like [[AssistCharacter Priests]] and [[DeflectorShields Shieldbearers]] are white, and the ''War of the Chosen''-exclusive [[KillItWithFire Purifiers]] are clad in bright orange. |
| 231 | ** As a meta example: it's fairly common for players to assign each of XCOM's soldier classes a specific color for ease of identification on the battlefield. |
| 232 | * ComebackMechanic: Losing experienced soldiers is probably the most expensive loss you can incur; however, as you progress, the game's Resistance HQ and the Black Market offer highly-ranked soldiers for purchase (up to Colonel). This lets you rebuild your army relatively quickly, though at a high cost in supplies. |
| 233 | * ContinuingIsPainful: Mission difficulty isn't balanced according to the size of your squad or the experience level of its members. Losing veterans will force you to rely on rookies, making subsequent missions more difficult to complete and potentially increasing the death rate of your men... which, in turn, will force you to rely even ''more'' on rookies. Good luck. |
| 234 | * ContinuityNod: |
| 235 | ** Researching a new tier of weapons triggers a cutscene in which Lily tests it out on a cardboard cutout displaying enemy artwork from ''Enemy Unknown''. Also counts as a BrickJoke, as ''that'' game did the same but using artwork from the first game in the franchise, ''VideoGame/XComUFODefense''. |
| 236 | ** The first time you encounter a [[VoluntaryShapeshifting Faceless]], Tygan ponders if there might be a way [[VideoGame/XCOMEnemyUnknown to contain them for study]]. Shen quickly shoots the idea down. |
| 237 | ** Tygan, Shen and Bradford will all make references to the previous generation of XCOM in their idle Avenger banter, from Tygan commenting on Dr. Valen's habit for personally overseeing interrogations to Bradford missing his old, iconic sweater. |
| 238 | ** Besides the shared names, ADVENT [=MECs=] are an obvious reference of the MEC Troopers of ''Enemy Within'' in terms of designs. Other than the fact that they are fully robotic unlike their predecessor, they have double-jointed legs, favor oversized cannon-like weapons, carry a back mounted GrenadeLauncher (which was a possible upgrade for MEC suits at tier 2) and generally resemble the MK I Warden MEC suits. What makes this interesting is that there's no sign in this continuity that XCOM ever actually go so far as to build MEC troopers. |
| 239 | ** Whenever he finishes an autopsy of an enemy from the first game, Tygan will make notes of how that unit used to act or look based on info from Central's experiences to contrast how they are now. |
| 240 | ** The basic PoweredArmor is called "Warden", the same name as the basic tier 1 model [=MEC=] suit in ''Enemy Within''. |
| 241 | ** The unique psionic aura of [[spoiler:The Commander]] is light blue, unlike the purple aura used by your regular psionic troopers and the Elders[=/=][[spoiler:Ethereals]]. [[spoiler: This is the same color as the "aura" of the "''real'' player character" of ''VideoGame/TheBureauXCOMDeclassified'']]. |
| 242 | ** At the end of the game, [[spoiler: the Elders[=/=]Ethereals once again warn you of a greater threat, moments before you destroy them]], just like they did in the final mission of ''Enemy Unknown''. |
| 243 | ** EXALT, a collaborateur faction in ''Enemy Within'', used to be a paramilitary group who often dressed in near-civilian gear, and used subversive tactics to undermine the established governments of the planet. Now XCOM fits this role, and the "Striped Bandana" prop for your troops, a dead ringer for the orange bandannas worn by all EXALT forces, brings this full circle. The only difference is that XCOM is pro-humanity. |
| 244 | ** The blueprints for the Spider Suit specifically state that it was based off schematics that they were able to scavenge from the old XCOM base, alluding to the functionally identical Skeleton Suit that you could build in ''VideoGame/XCOMEnemyUnknown.'' |
| 245 | ** After building the Shadow Chamber, which lets you know what enemies you will face in various missions, enemies you haven't encountered before are instead labelled "ENEMY UNKNOWN". |
| 246 | ** The implant removed from the Commander's head in the tutorial sequence closely resembles the MOSAIC implants from ''VideoGame/TheBureauXCOMDeclassified'' in both appearance and function. |
| 247 | ** During the cutscene for the Encrypted Codex Data, pictures of the aliens as they appeared in the previous game are displayed. |
| 248 | ** During Operation Last Gift, as Julian tells you about the SPARK, he mentions that it's an ideal body meant to house "an adept mind". This recalls the Ethereal's speech in the first game describing humanity as "an enduring physical form, paired with an equally adept mental capacity". |
| 249 | ** The Inside Look at the Lost has Bradford telling the Commander to tell the men to exercise restraint while using explosives. This was something Vahlen loved to say in the previous game, and that achieved memetic status.[[https://www.reddit.com/r/Xcom/comments/6qwe9w/xcom_2_war_of_the_chosen_inside_look_the_lost/dl0hv98/ The scriptwriter confessed at Reddit to wanting to make the joke.]] The [[https://i.redd.it/835i5abx1sfz.png Collateral Damage]] Dark Event also has Bradford making such a remark. |
| 250 | ** In ''War of the Chosen'', the illustration for the "Scavenge Alien Loot" Resistance Order is [[http://www.medinoc.fr/web/ImagesDiverses/Captures/Briefcase.png based on]] the 1994 BriefcaseFullOfMoney background. |
| 251 | * ContinuitySnarl: Besides the possible contradictions noted in AlternateTimeline, a few noteworthy snarls arose as part of the DLC added to the base game. |
| 252 | ** During the campaign, Bradford acts surprised at the emergence of several new alien types, as if they've not been encountered before. The Central Archives mode of the Tactical Legacy Pack shows him fighting those same aliens as much as twenty years earlier. More, it eventually features you playing a squad of late-game XCOM operatives with plasma weaponry and Alien alloy armor, despite XCOM being steamrolled before Plasma weaponry or even Carapace Armor was researched. Skirmishers, Templars, and Reapers are assured squad members despite not being possibly established yet (The Reapers are vaguely plausible, but the Templars haven't yet had ADVENT experiment with human Psionics and [[spoiler:ADVENT Troops haven't yet rebelled to form the Skirmishers.]] Finally, the last operation places great importance on Ana Ramirez and Peter Osei with how they're promoted as you progress, despite being rookie RedShirts in the tutorial level. Bradford himself seems to lampshade these AcceptableBreaksFromReality for the sake of gameplay, claiming [[UnreliableNarrator his memory might be a bit fuzzy.]] |
| 253 | ** The ''War Of The Chosen'' expansion properly introduces three new factions opposing ADVENT, including the hunter-survivor Reapers and the rebelling ADVENT soldiers who become the Skirmishers. [[spoiler:That the Skirmishers are made up of alien-human hybrid warriors is common knowledge among the factions, and we get to see them without helmets very early. This makes the story wildly contradicting when XCOM investigates the ADVENT Forge facility, 'discovering' that ADVENT are cloned, not born or modified humans. You can even take a Skirmisher on that mission! However, as the Reapers are canonically responsible in ''War Of The Chosen'' for locating the Commander, and their lore is deeply intwined with the Skirmishers and Templars[[note]]who themselves are set up to play a large role in the sequel[[/note]], this makes the Forge facility mission -- a mandatory part of the story -- outright ridiculous in context. ''VideoGame/XCOMChimeraSquad'' patches this discrepancy by revealing that there are two ways to create ADVENT troopers: some are former humans, while others were cloned.]] |
| 254 | * CoolButInefficient: Analyzing an ADVENT turret unlocks the Defense Matrix, a special room aboard the ''Avenger'' that gives your deployment zone heavy turret coverage in case a UFO tracks you down. While undoubtedly useful when that happens, it's also the only thing the room does, it requires power to operate (not much, but still), the turrets only become effective stat-wise when the Matrix is staffed with an engineer you might have better use for, and the number of such battles you'll have to fight in the whole campaign is somewhere between two and none. Depending on how the RNG feels about your mission roster, it's also not unusual to never be able to salvage a turret wreck at all, or so late in the campaign that the one UFO Defense mission you get on average is long over by then. Long story short, the Defense Matrix is a cool thing to have, but so situational in its use that using its room slot for something else tends to be much more efficient overall. |
| 255 | ** The Matrix will also protect against Chosen sabotage attacks but you need a mod to unlock this as it was commented out in vanilla game. |
| 256 | * CoolStarship: The ''Avenger'', XCOM's new headquarters, is a massive VTOL-esque spaceship converted from an alien supply craft. |
| 257 | * ContinuityCameo: A Viper in its Thin Man form from the previous game makes a brief but memorable appearance during a flashback to the Commander's capture by the aliens. |
| 258 | * ContractualBossImmunity: Averted. Even boss enemies like Sectopods, Alien Rulers, Chosen Ones, [[spoiler:Gatekeepers, and even Avatars]] are not immune to the Repeater's instant kill. The problem is getting it to activate, since it has a 15% chance at best. |
| 259 | * CowardlyMooks: Some of the weaker type of AVENT forces like Troopers or Sectoids have a chance of making a run for it if the rest of their pod has been wiped out. Oddly enough, they will join up with another pod and start patrolling with them like nothing had happened. |
| 260 | * TheCracker: While any soldier can try to perform some HollywoodHacking on various devices, the Specialist specializes in it, and the Combat Hacker skill tree of the specialist can even [[HackYourEnemy hack robotic units]]. While they are not (necessarily) malicious, the sheer degree to which they specialize in [[CombatPragmatist brutal and pragmatic tactics]] (hacking enemy troopers' brains, or using their implants through EverythingIsOnline to disorient (like a flashbang grenade does) every enemy on the map to outright pulling a MindControl on an enemy for 2 turns) puts them squarely in cracker territory. |
| 261 | * CrapsackWorld: For those living under the ADVENT administration, life is great - they have their every need catered for, [[CrapsaccharineWorld as long as they don't mind submitting to a complete loss of freedom and privacy under an oppressive regime that may one day harvest them for their own ends]]. For everyone else, though, life's not so great. Much of Earth has been devastated after the invasion, with cities such as Berlin and Moscow still remaining uninhabitable ''two decades'' after the invasion, and even outside the still-habitable city centers there are miles of slums. Those beyond ADVENT's control (such as XCOM and the Resistance) eke out an existence in the wilderness, constantly on the run from reprisal squads sent to slaughter them for the crime of living off the grid. Oh, and as of ''War of the Chosen'', there's also a ZombieApocalypse going on that ADVENT seems to be struggling to contain. |
| 262 | * CrazyPrepared: According to the prequel novel ''Resurrection'', the resistance found out the hard way that ADVENT has three layers of redundant security onboard their transports to prevent theft: biometrics that prevent the craft from being piloted by humans, then a tracking beacon that calls down ADVENT troops on the craft's position if the biometrics is hacked, and finally if both security measures are breached the craft vaporizes itself. |
| 263 | * CreatorCameo: |
| 264 | ** Continued from the previous game's Sid Meier HeroUnit, and then taken up to eleven. Nearly every developer is downloadable in the game to demonstrate the "character pool" feature, bringing in unique appearance combinations and hilarious descriptions. |
| 265 | ** One possible scan location is the "Fire Axis". |
| 266 | * CriticalExistenceFailure: Downplayed. In combat, units are perfectly capable of moving and fighting so long as they have at least one HP. At the end of missions, however, soldiers who have been wounded will limp slightly. Heavily wounded soldiers will fall to their knees. Furthermore, a critically injured unit can be "[[ShellShockedVeteran shaken]]", resulting in a Will penalty. |
| 267 | * CustomBuiltHost: the Avatar project is an attempt to comb through the DNA of [[HumanResources millions of captured humans]] in order to create the perfect host bodies for the now-dying [[BigBad Ethereals]]. |
| 268 | * CuteMachines: The Gremlins appear to have a rough approximation for a face, with their optics even having mechanical eyelids of sorts that even blink. Shen in particular treats hers like a pet and gets terribly upset whenever it gets damaged. |
| 269 | * CuttingOffTheBranches: This game is a sequel to the GameOver ending of ''Enemy Unknown''. XCOM completely failed to stop the invasion and the Earth's governments chose to surrender. |
| 270 | * CyberPunk: The game design certainly took a few cues from the genre. It features futuristic technology that have good as well as horrifying applications, the game revolves around fighting the monolithic evil overlords ruling society, and the host of customization options encourage your soldiers to be colorful, unique operatives like any Cyberpunk character. Most evident in the "slums" environment, which feature the futuristic, grimy, neon-lighted streets pervasive in the genre. The Anarchy's Children DLC pack embraces the aesthetic, with even more outlandish and punk-looking customization options. |
| 271 | [[/folder]] |
| 272 | |
| 273 | [[folder:D - H]] |
| 274 | * DamageTyping: The game differentiates between "lightly wounded", "wounded" and "gravely wounded" soldiers. The only difference between them is usually the time it takes to fully recuperate (each category rolls on a fairly broad, overlapping time table for every wounded soldier at the end of the mission), with only one exception: a Templar resistance order that allows lightly wounded soldiers to be deployed on missions. |
| 275 | * DamnYouMuscleMemory: |
| 276 | ** When Shadowstep says that a Ranger does not trigger Overwatch, it really does mean that he does not trigger Overwatch. This is not to be confused with the Assault's Lightning Reflexes from the first game, now exclusive to the Advanced Warfare Centre, that still triggers Overwatch but makes the first one an automatic miss. Making that mistake can hurt. |
| 277 | ** In-universe, anyone with Bladestorm can run into this problem. It grants a reflexive attack against enemies who get too close, but once they are trained in the technique, they can't ''not'' use it, and it is still vulnerable to being parried and counter-attacked, making it a liability sometimes. |
| 278 | * DarkIsNotEvil: XCOM is a secretive, subversive underground organization who tend to go for a fairly dark default color scheme. The Council representative is a black-suited man wreathed in shadow whose face is constantly obscured by darkness, and who speaks in a very creepy voice. Yet XCOM are trying to save humanity, and the Council representative is basically the game's BigGood. |
| 279 | * DataPad: A very common sight, and even referred to by the trope's name (only spelled as a single word, "datapad"). Tygan and Shen both have one, non-Specialist soldiers use one when hacking, and ADVENT Datapads are valuable mission loot that can be decrypted in the labs for a few days to yield intel or sold instantly for supplies. |
| 280 | * DeadGuyOnDisplay: The Hunter's Lodge replaces the Armory with the ''Alien Hunter'' DLC, using either the mounted heads or the propped-up mechanical shells of defeated ADVENT as a grisly way to record your stats over the campaign. |
| 281 | * TheDeadHaveNames: Civilians killed during alien retaliation missions all have unique names, hammering home how every loss is bad. |
| 282 | * DecapitatedArmy: Killing the FinalBoss will grant you victory regardless of how many mooks are on the field waiting their turn to shoot or tear your men's faces off. |
| 283 | * DefectorFromDecadence: Tygan worked for ADVENT before he realised how rotten the aliens are and fled to join XCOM. |
| 284 | ** The Skirmishers are a group of renegade former ADVENT troopers who broke away from the callous control of the Elders and now seek to either free their brethren, or put them out of their misery entirely. |
| 285 | * DevelopersForesight: |
| 286 | ** The game main menu screen will feature one of your soldiers in the current campaign (or your previous one if starting a new one), with their current armor, weapon (with mods), and gear. It will even pick an environment based on the current mission, such as a burning resistance settlement, or a recent mission if you saved and exited after mission is over. There's even unique main menu screens for the Chosen missions! |
| 287 | ** Andromedons are coded as organic enemies, despite their hulking power armor, so standard tactics apply. However, once their pilot is killed and the suits become autonomous, they're now classified as mechanical, and as such, they can be harmed by EMP weaponry, receive extra damage from Gremlin attacks, and can even be hacked. |
| 288 | ** At the start of the campaign, rookie promotions are rigged to give one of each base class before being picked randomly (in other words, the first four promotions, ''not'' the four soldiers on the first mission, will always be Ranger, Specialist, Grenadier, Sharpshooter, before you start seeing repeats). If you mod in additional classes, the game will add them to the queue. |
| 289 | ** A soldier will react appropriately if placed in front of a wanted poster depicting them. |
| 290 | ** Pay special attention to units returning from a mission. If it's Flawless or Excellent, the Happy-Go-Lucky personality soldiers will be smirking, while Normal soldiers will simply have a quiet smile. Any deaths will have the soldiers sitting back and forth in contemplation. A SoleSurvivor will be hunched over, with his or her head buried in their hands in grief. |
| 291 | ** Unlike the base in the previous game, where you have lots of unnamed characters in the base while you look at it, the Avenger is crewed entirely by the people you have recruited. Engineers will man the posts you assigned them to while idle ones or those that are busy clearing space in the Avenger can be seen in the bridge. Your soldiers can be seen manning less skill important posts like the armory maintenance, hangar, and the radar stations on the bridge. Off-duty crew of all types can be seen in the bar and living quarters. The only room that doesn't have anyone in it, ever? [[NonEntityGeneral The Commander's room]]. |
| 292 | ** Rulers don't react to free actions and take an action for every one your units do, so what if you try to game them by using all your free actions then ending your turn? They get half of the unused actions of your units to wreak havoc unchecked. |
| 293 | ** If a Chosen captures or extracts information from Jane Kelly[[note]]a MauveShirt who joins your squad if you went through the tutorial[[/note]], they will refer to her by name when they taunt you. |
| 294 | ** If the surveillance tower hacking result for "Deception" (gives you control of a random enemy for 2 turns) chooses the hostile VIP on a capture/kill mission, running the VIP into the extraction zone and airlifting them out counts as a win, even though the on-screen objective to Capture or Kill the Enemy VIP remains technically unfulfilled. |
| 295 | ** As seen [[https://imgur.com/a/N9zUYed here,]] in darker maps such as nighttime or in Lost city ruins, XCOM operatives keep their weapon-mounted flashlights off while they're in concealment. [[SoMuchForStealth After being revealed]], it's no use to hide, so they turn them on. |
| 296 | ** Ability description texts in the menus are quite flexibly coded. If, for instance, you INI-mod the Specialist's Guardian ability to have a 100% trigger chance instead of the normal 50%, its description will accurately reflect the change in-game. Similarly, descriptions that refer to a specific weapon (like the Ranger's shotgun for the Rapid Fire ability) usually adapt themselves automatically when given to another class that wields different armaments. |
| 297 | * DifficultButAwesome: [[CoolTank Hacking a Sectopod]]. If you manage to be blessed by [=RNGsus=], and pass its 125 to 150 hack level (potentially even more if it a certain Dark Event is active), you now have a heavily armored walking tank that can shred armor with its main gun, electrocute anyone dumb enough to fight it close range, and has a powerful WaveMotionGun that can obliterate '''anything''' in its path. In addition, the enemy will start attacking ''it'', instead of your troops. If you fail... you'll have to deal with not only that, ''but said robot will gain extra buffs to defense and mobility.'' Hope you're using SaveScumming. Also, make sure it's far away, because the hack isn't permanent, meaning it'll turn against you after a short while. |
| 298 | ** Killing the Viper King during the first Alien Hunters mission to [[spoiler: Vahlen's]] ruined lab. It's difficult for reasons unrelated to actual combat: the Viper King is designed to run after he loses about 33% of his hit points, which means that you need to drop the hammer on him hard and fast, but you're also up against the Ruler Reaction system, which gives him an action after every one of ''your'' actions, and which you might not be familiar with. The best way to keep him from running is to ''surround'' him so that he ''can't'', which is difficult if you don't have the full 6-person team (which you likely won't this early in the game), because he'll enjoy hitting you after everyone moves up to him, and he has no problem squirming through any hole you forget about. Your biggest advantage is the fact that Bradford is ''massively'' overpowered for this mission, and his Bladestorm ability can activate every time the Viper King moves. If you give Bradford the Hunter's Axe, use Frost Grenades, and get lucky with stunning shots from the Boltcaster, then you'll be rewarded with the Viper King armor ''well'' in advance of when you would normally get Predator armor, and while Vipers are still considered rare enemies, meaning the strongest enemy on the battlefield has a good chance to ''freak out'' when they see your Viper Armor-clad soldier running up to them. |
| 299 | * DiminishingReturnsForBalance: Engineers and scientists suffer from this effect. Your first scientist can reduce your research times by a maximum of 33%[[note]]at level 10+, only obtainable via console commands[[/note]]. The second one only nets another 25% tops, then 20%, 17%, 13% and so on. The same happens the more engineers you allocate to clearing rubble from the same room, though that tops out at 3. |
| 300 | * DiscOneNuke: The randomized abilities for Psi-troopers easily result in a game-breaking combination, like an attack that strikes all enemies in a line for 10-12 damage when enemies only have 5-8 health. Additionally, psionic soldiers can be unlocked by the end of the second month if you manage your development right. |
| 301 | ** The Enemy Within era weapons from the Tactical Legacy Pack are equivalent to their current weapons, only coming premodded, not able to accept other mods, and impossible to upgrade through research breakthrough. DownplayedTrope, as they are perfectly serviceable late game due to being modded in a reasonably BoringButPractical fashion, but will underperform compared to the '''actual''' late game weapons. |
| 302 | ** While the Alien Hunter weapons deal with NecessaryDrawback, they are much better than the base weapon equivalents. The Boltcaster does more damage than the shotgun and can stun 25% of the time. The Shadowkeeper is more powerful and accurate than the base pistol, making it very effective in Lost missions (especially when paired with Between The Eyes for guaranteed kills). The Hunter's Axe is stronger than the Sword and gives a single use ranged attack. The upgraded versions can be cost prohibitive as, unlike standard weapons, they have to be upgraded individually, but for how early you get them, they are very powerful. |
| 303 | ** Repeaters are insanely effective. They take up a modification slot on the gun itself (which can mount a maximum of four if you're lucky), but they give you a small but consistent chance to outright kill ''anything'' you shoot, from the lowliest ADVENT Trooper to [[spoiler: Avatars]] and Alien Rulers, regardless of how much HP they have left. The Superior Repeater, combined with the bonus to increase effectiveness, has a ''one-in-five chance'' to simply erase any problem it hits. And you can get Advanced Repeaters (10% chance, 15% chance if you have the bonus) in the ''first month'' if you're lucky. |
| 304 | ** The Breakthrough that increases damage for all weapons of a specific type. Regardless of what you're going for in terms of speed, having +1 damage to all rifles, shotguns, sniper rifles, or cannons (and rarely bullpup rifles and Vektor rifles) is excellent early in the game, when your base weapons are ''just'' a little too weak to reliably kill anything more than an ADVENT Trooper. And the damage bonus carries over to all upgraded weapons as well. |
| 305 | ** The Rapid Collection and (to a lesser extent) Resistance Network resistance orders from the Reapers. Rapid Collection means supply drops are collected instantly, and Resistance Network means new regions are contacted instantly. While this might not seem like a big deal, Supply Drop collection takes 3 days and requires you to move the Avenger, meaning it will take about 5 days total to get to the drop, get the supplies, and get back to what you were doing. And that's every 21 days, meaning a quarter of your time is spend getting needed supplies. Region contacts take between 4 and 7 days, with generally equal movement time. Being able to do those things ''instantly'' means you can spend more time scanning for rumors, allowing you to get more caches of other things, like recruits, intel, rare alien tech, weapons mods, and more. |
| 306 | * DoNotAdjustYourSet: |
| 307 | ** Inverted in the launch trailer, as the broadcast is hijacked by the good guys: |
| 308 | --->'''ADVENT Speaker:''' ''And we rejoice in the destruction of the insurgent organization known as XC-''\ |
| 309 | '''The Informant:''' ''XCOM... lives!'' |
| 310 | ** Played with in the game itself. [[spoiler: Your first introduction to "ADVENT retaliations" is Central communicating with a Resistance cell, only for The Speaker to cut into the transmission, informing the populace about new measures being taken to curb the "terrorist" threat. This transmission hijack interferes with Central's attempt to warn the colony about incoming ADVENT troops, sent to wipe them out.]] |
| 311 | * DownerBeginning: XCOM suffered a devastating loss during the war against the aliens, its members are scattered or dead, and the alien invaders have effortlessly conquered Earth. By the time the game starts, the aliens have a vice grip on the planet. |
| 312 | * DungeonBypass: |
| 313 | ** Occasionally when you hack into nodes you can get coordinates to Avatar research facilities, allowing you to go do those missions even if you haven't made contact with that region. |
| 314 | ** Attacking Chosen strongholds normally involves fighting through several pods until the team can access the teleportation chamber to the Chosen's inner sanctum. However, blasting your way through the walls instead of using the doors can shorten the approach and potentially circumvent some pods, assuming you get lucky with the randomized stronghold layout. If you don't, you're just wasting grenades. That's XCOM, baby. |
| 315 | * DwindlingParty: The first floor of the facility Shen's Last Gift takes place in has an elevator that will take your troops to the next floor, but said elevator can only carry one soldier per turn. Therefore, you are forced to slowly whittle down your party, all the while Julian keeps sending more Derelict [=MECs=] at you. The second floor has two elevators, but the schtick is otherwise the same. |
| 316 | * DysfunctionJunction: Taking a moment to read the standard pool of biographies generated for recruits will paint a picture of a ragtag organization filled with traumatized veterans, plucky survivors, and possibly escaped convicts. Fortunately, this is all fluff, and has little bearing in-game. |
| 317 | * EarlyGameHell: As per usual for the series: at the start of the game, you have basic troops with the ability to shoot fairly well, but without much power, and throw a grenade, while alien and ADVENT forces have a bag of many tricks they can use to mess with you. As your soldiers rank up to develop more abilities and research advances, you start getting abilities that let you disrupt the battlefield even more effectively than your opponents, and mess with the rules of combat more and more. By the midpoint of the game, your basic rookies are as strong as or stronger than the basic aliens (who do not advance) and almost on par with the Advanced/Elite ADVENT forces, while your experience soldiers are dancing around the battlefield, using heavy armor to throw rockets, killing 4 or more enemies with a sniper rifle in a single turn, and generally making it almost impossible for the aliens to use their stronger abilities without being horribly punished. It's telling that the casualty rate is, as is typical for XCOM, much higher at the beginning of the game than at the end. |
| 318 | ** Perhaps best exemplified by Operation Gatecrasher if you choose not to play the tutorial mission, as it opens the game with you having ''the absolutel minimum'' forces at your disposal (4 rookies with default equipment and a single grenade each) against ''two'' squads of ADVENT soldiers, including an Officer (whose Mark Target ability is an almost guaranteed death sentence for whichever soldier he picks out unless they're in full cover ''and'' you get lucky). On Commander difficulty (where even the default ADVENT soldiers are an equal match for your rookies, if not actually ''superior'') and higher you may find it close to ''physically impossible'' to even beat the very first mission of the game unless the RNG falls considerably in your favour because you're simply ''that'' badly outmatched. |
| 319 | ** The Legacy Operations, short self-contained mini-campaigns made up of a straight chain of combat encounters, tend to feature this in the beginning. The very first mission of 'Blast From the Past', for example, provides you with very close to the bare minimum force- one Squaddie of each class with kevlar armour, ballistic weapons and one grenade apiece. You have to wipe out four Faceless (which are ''incredible'' damage soaks against your pathetic weapons), two Vipers and a Sectoid while taking the minimal damage possible, and ideally as quickly as possible if you want the best score. Oh, AND you don't have concealment. Not only do you have to have flawless tactics, but even more luck than usual- only one or two missed shots and you're screwed, as two hits from anything will kill one of your guys (which, with a -5000 point penalty means you can kiss your gold campaign medal goodbye) and if the Vipers get even one action off they WILL tongue drag and bind you, which is death, especially when the Faceless are still bearing down on you. It gets a lot easier quite quickly in successive missions as your squad size increases, your guys learn more skills, upgrade their gear and acquire neat new tools, but that first mission is just hellish. |
| 320 | * EasterEgg: There's a 1-in-500 chance of a mission's randomized title including the word "chicken" in it for your InherentlyFunnyWords needs. |
| 321 | -->"var localized string m_strChicken; // I just want to use "Chicken" every once in a while" |
| 322 | * EasyLogistics: Easier than ''Enemy Within'' and the original 1994 X-Com. |
| 323 | ** As with Enemy Within, you essentially have unlimited supplies of conventional ballistic weapons and Kevlar armor. |
| 324 | ** Once you develop Predator or Warden Armor and Magnetic or Plasma Weapons, all operatives will automatically have their weapons and armor upgraded, and their Modular Weapon attachments will be inherited by their new weapons. Note that the graphics for the attachments is markedly different between the three tiers of weapons. Compare to previous XCOM and X-Com games where you need to fabricate each weapon and suit of armor individually, and to the specialized armor that must be individually assembled at the Proving Grounds. |
| 325 | ** Much of your monthly upkeep is simplified to Power being diverted from the Elerium generator aboard the Avenger and steady stream of Supplies to feed the personnel and maintain the hardware. Firebrand also doesn't need fuel for her missions; either the fuel is abstracted as part of your supplies or she draws power off the Avenger's generator. |
| 326 | ** Proving Ground projects seem to allocate resources for fabrication that allow you to always have X amount of a developed Experimental weapon or armor available per mission once you complete them, and it seems to require little more than you passing the engineer(s) in the Proving Grounds an Elerium Core and some other ingredients. |
| 327 | ** One minor detail that is handled more realistically is that the loot you can recover from timed missions that require extraction is markedly reduced compared to "normal" missions, as your operatives simply lack the time needed to load Firebrand with whatever corpses the enemies leave behind before being forced to leave by approaching ADVENT interceptors. In such missions, the only loot directly recovered from the field are any Elerium Cores and modular weapons parts taken from slain ADVENT troopers and aliens (plus "one-time" corpses such as the first Codex Brain or the Ruler corpses). |
| 328 | ** Monthly/weekly supply drops are not directly carried to the Avenger immediately - instead, the Commander must direct the Avenger to the arranged drop point and scan to locate the resources, which presumably are hidden to prevent discovery by ADVENT. Some of the mission 'reward' contact points generated after successful missions that can be scanned for in this manner are {{Permanently Missable|Content}} if you don't allocate the time needed to find them after a few days. Furthermore, there exists an ADVENT Dark Event that can reduce the amount of supplies that can be smuggled to XCOM via the drop due to increased security checkpoints. |
| 329 | * EmergentNarrative: The series allows the player to customize each and every soldier, which has the result of [[VideoGameCaringPotential making the player care about what happens to them.]] It is quite common for a player to construct a personalized narrative about their troops in reaction to what occurs during missions as a supplement to the game's official plot. |
| 330 | * EmpathyDollShot: A scale model figure of the [[Videogame/XCOMEnemyUnknown Raven Interceptor]] can be seen on the ground at the attacked resistance haven in the cutscene for the first Retaliation Mission. |
| 331 | * EnclosedExtraterrestrials: |
| 332 | ** The Andromedons are unable to breathe oxygen and the atmosphere of their own planet is toxic to humans. As a result, the ones encountered during the game all wear PoweredArmor with samples of the gases they breathe sealed inside them. Depleting an Andromedon's health results in the suit's glass-like "helmet" shattering, with the alien inside briefly spasming as they quickly suffocate... leaving the player with [[AnimatedArmor the suit itself now operating autonomously]]. |
| 333 | ** The Gatekeepers are largely shapeless tentacled blobs that always keep themselves within spherical metallic shells. That being said, while they spend most of their time in the closed-up state, they do open their shells and "expose" their bodies to the environment whenever they exercise their psionic powers, only to immediately close it up as a free reaction the moment they're struck with enemy fire. |
| 334 | * EnemyMine: With the Resistance Warrior DLC, some randomly-generated soldiers can come equipped with outfits and accessories similar to those of [[AncientConspiracy EXALT]], XCOM's rival from Enemy Within, suggesting that the two have banded together in the face of the Aliens' conquest of Earth. The fact that the readily-available Striped Bandanna available as a cosmetic option looks exactly like [=EXALT's=] signature accessory only adds further evidence. You can defy this, however, with the [[https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=877345415 EXALT: Back in Action mod]]. |
| 335 | * EquipmentHidingFashion: CharacterCustomisation can be set to override equipment (and other things that affect appearance, like cybernetics and the LockedIntoStrangeness associated with units who develop psionic powers). |
| 336 | * EveryCarIsAPinto: Practically an ExaggeratedTrope - unlike ''Enemy Unknown''[='s cars that are likely to explode from eating laser and plasma fire or explosives, =]''2'''s can explode just by being vaguely nearly by any firefight. |
| 337 | ** A good rule of thumb: if the car has a fire coming out of its engine, it will explode next turn. However, the Plasma Grenade and explosives beyond Frag Grenades will cause the car to explode instantly. |
| 338 | ** This is also true for ADVENT - sometimes you can have a lucky ending when an unfortunate group of troopers get [[TotalPartyKill incinerated]]. Did we mention that exploding cars deal 8 to 10 damage, and can completely [[TotalPartyKill wreck one mission]] if it explodes when the [[OhCrap rest of your crew are taking cover behind it]]? |
| 339 | ** And then turned up to eleven in ''War of the Chosen'' with the Reapers' Remote Start ability that can blow up any explosive world object (cars included) with twice their normal power and blast radius. Cars deal an astounding 12 to 16 damage, so almost any enemy is wiped out. |
| 340 | *** There's even an achievement for this, called Car Wrecked. |
| 341 | * EverythingIsAnIPodInTheFuture: The shining white ADVENT cities use this aesthetic, at least until you get out into the slums, where it degenerates into UsedFuture. |
| 342 | * EvilCounterpart: A few of XCOM's soldier classes have their counterparts on the enemy's side. |
| 343 | ** Stun Lancers are the evil versions of your own Rangers, as they can dash significant distances to deliver a devastating melee to your soldiers. |
| 344 | ** Mutons are another interesting counterpoint to your Rangers - they can shoot back at you like rifle-equipped Rangers, enter melee range with the bayonets on their plasma rifles, and possess cover-destroying armor-shredding grenades. |
| 345 | ** ADVENT [=MECs=] are the evil counterpart to Shen's [=MEC=] troopers from ''Enemy Within'', with a similar heavy armor support role. They even have the cover-destroying grenade launcher attachment that MEC-3 Paladins can wield. ''Shen's Last Gift'' reveal they are based of the XCOM SPARK prototype. Making them a literal evil counterpart to the SPARK. |
| 346 | ** Your own powerful Psi-operatives have psionically powerful alien adversaries, but none are quite as similar to them as [[spoiler: the Avatars]]. |
| 347 | ** Both the Officers' Mark and your Grenadiers' Holo Targeting grant additional Aim to their allies against the designated target. They even use differently-coloured versions of the same effect. |
| 348 | ** Exaggerated by the [[http://steamcommunity.com/workshop/filedetails/?id=870593225 MOCX Initiative mod]], which gives ADVENT EliteMooks that use the same classes as XCOM and can get promotions and PCS as they survive missions. They even wear the Carapace Armour from the first game. |
| 349 | * EvolvingTitleScreen: The main menu scene usually show a soldier observing an ADVENT patrol, but the scene usually resembles the mission in your latest save, and the soldier is always one of those you have in the mission. If your latest save is not in mission, then the scene is random, but it always feature one of your soldiers. |
| 350 | * ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin: A big plot point is figuring out the purpose of the "Avatar Project". If you know what the word Avatar literally means [[note]]"A manifestation of a divinity or soul in earthly form, an incarnate"[[/note]] and you realize the Elders are treated as gods (Down to the ADVENT Speaker's preacher-like speeches and reverend-like outfit)... Well the project's name is literally telling you what its end goal is. [[spoiler:To create hybrid human/alien bodies for the Ethereals to inhabit]]. |
| 351 | * ExactTimeToFailure: Once the progress bar for the Avatar Project is filled, a countdown will be displayed for 15-20 days (depending on difficulty level). That's how long you have in-game to set back progress on the Project. Otherwise, the completion of the Project will result in [[GameOver XCOM's immediate and total defeat]]. |
| 352 | * ExplodingBarrels: Propane tanks and gas pumps can be targeted by weapons and shot if there are enemies within the resulting blast radius. |
| 353 | * ExtinctInTheFuture: After taking over Earth, the aliens exterminated most animals. Lily Shen raises the question of where Advent Burgers come from if cows don't exist anymore. |
| 354 | * EyeScream: When [[spoiler:Tygan shows the atrophy of the Elders' bodies in time lapse]], part of it involves their eyes wilting away in their sockets until little but an empty skull remains. |
| 355 | * FailedASpotCheck: The enemies in the game are essentially blind and deaf to everything other than your own troops. This means they will not be alerted by your team blowing up cars and shooting at other aliens if your team is just slightly out of their own visual range. |
| 356 | * FallingDamage: Averted in most cases, where units can jump off two-story buildings with impunity. However, blowing the floor out from under someone with a grenade will cause them to take damage both from the explosion and the resulting fall. |
| 357 | * FeaturelessProtagonist: In this game, the player character (The Commander) actually has a physical presence in the world, so naturally, almost every detail about them is obscured. When the Commander is first rescued from their confinement, they're wearing a thick, astronaut-like suit that obscures even their gender, and once you're freed all cutscenes shift to first person or have the Commander absent. The other characters don't even use pronouns, either, it's just "Commander" or "the Commander." [[spoiler: Even the second time they take to the field, the Commander is remote controlling an Avatar body (androgynous, for good measure!) that never speaks on its own. However, when hit, the Commander's Avatar lets out a scream like an ADVENT soldier]]. |
| 358 | * FighterMageThief: The three resistance factions in ''War of the Chosen'' very neatly fall into this. |
| 359 | ** Fighter: Skirmishers, rogue ADVENT supersoldiers that specialize at close-quarters combat. Leveled up they are essentially a player-controlled Alien Ruler. |
| 360 | ** Mage: Templars, psionic shock troops that are part of a secret order that nobody knows much about currently. What is known is they can shoot lightning from their fingertips, summon powerful storms and create doppelgangers of themselves. |
| 361 | ** Thief: Reapers, survivalist sharpshooters that can kill without breaking Concealment, have a large boost to movement when hidden and a significantly reduced detection range. |
| 362 | ** The Chosen themselves fit as well. One is a psionic, one a sniper, one a blademaster. |
| 363 | * FireForgedFriends: |
| 364 | ** In ''War of the Chosen'', soldiers who fight together on mission can develop bonds which will allow them to develop new abilities to support each other. Soldiers with developed or potential bonds will be seen hanging out together on the Avenger between missions. |
| 365 | ** Outrider and Mox start off hostile to one another (Outrider holds a ''serious'' grudge against Mox for slaughtering Reapers whilst he was still under ADVENT's control), but fighting the Assassin and the Lost together with XCOM makes them come to respect each other. (In-game, they have very little cohesion with each other, making it difficult to have them establish a bond. But not ''impossible''.) |
| 366 | * FlunkyBoss: The final boss spawns alongside a pair of Archons, and will continuously summon trios of mid-tier aliens to fight alongside it. |
| 367 | ** The Chosen all have the ability to summon common ADVENT units into battle. They can also gain a variety of special traits, which allows them to summon more exotic units. |
| 368 | * {{Foreshadowing}}: |
| 369 | ** Lily will mention she once considered linking an ADVENT [=MEC=] to a Gremlin's AI to make robotic XCOM personnel, before deciding against it as Bradford likely would not agree with reactivating a [=MEC=] in the base. Come ''Shen's Last Gift'', the SPARK is essentially just that, down to its default head being based on a Gremlin's chassis (they also share the same HUD). Ironically, the SPARK actually came first in-universe and was modified to create [=MECs=]. |
| 370 | ** The mysterious place one can glimpse when [[spoiler:Shen and Tygan open the psionic gateway aboard the Avenger for the first time is the Elders' hidden undersea HQ - the site of the FinalBattle]]. |
| 371 | ** With ''War of the Chosen'' installed, the very first cutscene that introduces all three Chosen together contains a quick shot of something that won't become relevant until the very end of the game. [[spoiler:Namely, the ominous psionic ''something'' snaking from a fissure on the ocean floor that's implied to be the GreaterScopeVillain the Elders were desperately trying to prepare for.]] |
| 372 | ** Autopsies of some enemies will reveal that they are hybrids of human and alien genetic material. [[spoiler:One gets the impression that they were trial runs for Project Avatar.]] |
| 373 | ** The game's cover art, as shown in the page image, depicts an alien head made out of human skulls. [[spoiler:Once again, this is the basis of the Avatar Project: Making new alien bodies out of human material.]] |
| 374 | * FunWithAcronyms: Other than ADVENT (which isn't even confirmed to be one, since it's ''never'' dotted), there are the E.X.O. suit and the W.A.R. suit. |
| 375 | ** The Alien Hunters DLC adds the R.A.G.E suit. |
| 376 | * FutureCopter: XCOM uses rocket-powered VTOL craft as dropships, and their CoolStarship similarly uses a VTOL type design. |
| 377 | * GameBreakingBug: |
| 378 | ** If a Chrysalid Gestator was on a map, you couldn't load saves made while it's around. This could be mildly annoying in a regular run and might have required a reinstall, but if you took a break from an Ironman run in the middle of a retaliation mission, you just lost your game. Thankfully, this was [[http://steamcommunity.com/games/268500/announcements/detail/843667188501609284 patched in the first hotfix]], and all files affected should work. |
| 379 | ** The broken saves can also impact on other missions, probably based on the amount of enemy corpses on the map. Examples of missions that can break include [[spoiler:the Avenger Defense missions, due to the infinite respawns, and the final mission, due to the sheer number of enemies that show up.]] |
| 380 | ** It's possible for the Avenger to get "stuck" when traveling, which prevents you from doing ''anything'' aside from restarting the game. Considering the only fix seems to be loading an earlier save, this is devastating to an Ironman. |
| 381 | ** A VIP that starts in an armoured vehicle may die via it exploding for no discernible reason. |
| 382 | ** The aliens triggering too many XCOM Overwatch shots in a row can lock the game in an inescapable slow-mo sequence centered on the last XCOM operative to take a shot. Sometimes the bug resolves itself after a minute or two of waiting, but more often it doesn't, forcing a reload. |
| 383 | ** The story-heavy missions that kick off the ''Alien Hunters'' and ''Shen's Last Gift'' [=DLCs=] are seriously buggy. Both contain a lot of small cutscenes that should trigger when an operative enters a certain area, but many of these triggers often don't fire for reasons unknown. Reloading the latest (auto)save usually fixes this, but it's not guaranteed to work. |
| 384 | ** Supply Raid missions may spawn supply crates in inaccessible locations, like the very roof of buildings that even soldiers with grappling hooks can't reach. ADVENT will eventually grab them, but at the very least it screws up your perfect GottaCatchThemAll statistic for this mission. |
| 385 | ** In War of the Chosen, a particularly nasty bug occasionally occurs on VIP rescue missions, where the game will forget to assign the VIP actions, meaning they can't move or do anything. Thankfully, it's easy enough to use a console command to force the game to give actions. |
| 386 | ** Sometimes, after a certain point, enemies and civilian [=NPCs=] can stop spawning. On one hand, this makes many missions trivially easy. On the other, not only are UFO landings and Resistance Refuge defence missions now impossible to complete, but it means that the game's story can stop advancing if you still need to skulljack a codex or take on an Avatar. |
| 387 | * GameMod: After the great success of the ''Enemy Unknown'' mod ''Videogame/XCOMLongWar'', part of the goal during development was making ''XCOM 2'' easier to mod. The game has Workshop support on Steam, several lists of items and paremeters automatically add modded assets, and there are complete overhauls of the game's progression and mission systems, such as ''Covert Infiltration'' and the sequel to ''Long War'', ''Long War of the Chosen''. |
| 388 | * GameplayAndStorySegregation: |
| 389 | ** Some Retaliation missions in the [=WotC=] expansion can include NPC Resistance fighters armed with Assault Rifles, however in actual gameplay they are exceptionally accurate (having a base accuracy of 95, far more than a Rookie!) and their damage scales along with the overall gameplay progression. Missions involving them tend to compensate by having a larger number of 'assault' units like Berzerkers. |
| 390 | * GenderConcealingWriting: The tutorial section of the game has a short-lived example, avoiding the use of any gendered pronouns when referring to Chief Engineer Shen. A player who is familiar with ''Enemy Unknown'' (and hasn't seen anything in advance about this game's characters) is encouraged to assume that it's the same Dr. Shen who was chief engineer of XCOM in the earlier game, and it's only after the second tutorial mission that the player character learns that Dr. Shen is dead and the current chief engineer is his daughter, Lily. |
| 391 | * GenuineHumanHide: Genuine [[InvertedTrope Alien]] Hide in this case. The unique armor suits you can craft from the ''Alien Hunters'' DLC incorporate the Ruler Aliens' features to an almost disturbing degree, with [[http://media1.gameinformer.com/imagefeed/screenshots/XCOM2/XCOM2_Alien%20Hunters_Concept%20Art_ViperSuit.jpg the Serpent suit using the Viper King's head as a helmet]] and [[http://media1.gameinformer.com/imagefeed/screenshots/XCOM2/XCOM%202_Alien%20Hunters_Rage_04.jpg the R.A.G.E. suit using the Berserker Queen's skin as its armor plating]]. The aliens certainly consider this horrifying; if an enemy sees you wearing the armor made of their relevant species, they might actually panic and run away. |
| 392 | ** Also, your soldiers love decorating the Hunter's Lodge with tokens made from fallen enemies, like Viper snakeskin curtains or Berserker hide rugs. |
| 393 | * GeoEffects: As with its predecessor, buildings and cover can be destroyed to create new paths or expose enemies. In addition, blowing floors from under units, whether friendly or not, will make them fall, damaging or even killing them. This is the best way to take out ADVENT turrets guarding their bases, as a fall from their high perches will kill them at any height. |
| 394 | * GivingSomeoneThePointerFinger: Human-sized units that can take cover (humans, ADVENT troops, Sectoids and such) will point at a hostile that's flanking them. In XCOM's case, they also call out that they're getting flanked. |
| 395 | * GlobalCurrency: "Supplies" is your primary currency, since food and tools are worth more than gold to XCOM. (It uses the same currency symbol as the last game.) The second global currency is Intel, which is mostly spent on expanding your territory or buying assorted goods and personnel from the BlackMarket. |
| 396 | * GodzillaThreshold: |
| 397 | ** The normally super-secretive Informant hacks directly into the ADVENT Control Network without disguising his signal to quickly deliver a message of vital importance to the Commander: [[spoiler:that the Elders are planning to process all people, not just select ones, in a move that will result in the complete eradication of human life. Naturally, ADVENT catches onto his actions and moves in to kill him. His fate remains unknown, but it's unlikely he survived.]] |
| 398 | ** The above in turn means that the threshold has been crossed for the aliens as well. [[spoiler:Since XCOM has demonstrated that it can disrupt their schemes and kill the Avatars, they feel that in order to complete the Avatar Project in short order, they must collect every last drop of human genetic material.]] |
| 399 | ** If you think about it, once you have climbed high enough in the TechTree, your soldiers commit war crimes/crimes against humanity in the double digits on a per mission basis, but XCOM are still the good guys because the aliens are effectively committing a genocide against the entire human species. At least in War Of The Chosen (where those actually exist) XCOM is willing to work with and help ADVENT trooper (which are "human alien (genetically engineered) hybrids") deserters. The Elders are well willing to pull a YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness on an entire species. |
| 400 | * GoodScarsEvilScars: Bradford sports one. Players can also give their veteran soldiers various types of scars for cosmetics. Your soldiers can also develop scars naturally if they are injured during missions: being burned may result in burn scars on the face, being slashed or melee'd may cause a scar, and so on. These "extra" scars can still be removed through the character customization. |
| 401 | * GottaCatchThemAll: The "Brutal Collection" achievement requires you to skulljack/skullmine every type of ADVENT soldier in the game. Depending on which [[GuideDangIt guide]] you believe, this involves four[[note]]Trooper, Officer, Lancer, Shieldbearer[[/note]], six[[note]]The aforementioned, plus Purifier and Priest[[/note]] or as many as ''eighteen'' targets[[note]]The basic, advanced and elite versions of all six types[[/note]], although testing has shown that you need to jack four types for the base game and six with ''War of the Chosen'' installed; their rank isn't important. Some claim the Codex being part of the list, too, but that's difficult to verify since skulljacking a Codex is part of the story anyway (although that also applies to the Officer, so... [[RiddleForTheAges yeah]]). |
| 402 | * GreaterScopeParagon: Possibly hinted at a few times. Right after the tutorial mission [[spoiler:as Tygan is removing the implant from the commander, it seems like they're dying, until an image of an Ethereal appears, waving its hand and causing a glow that fades into the commander temporarily regaining consciousnesses and stabilizing.]] At the start of the final mission [[spoiler:as the Commander is being linked to the Avatar, the same Ethereal again appears, waving his hand as the connection is established. Later, as the Commander and their squad assault the Avatar base, they receive communications from the Speaker and "Angelis Ethereal," basically telling the Commander to knock it off. Then, another Ethereal (using the voice from Enemy Within, rather than the more feminine voice of XCOM 2), breaks into the chatter, urging the Commander on to defeat the aliens "as you did before." Exactly who this Ethereal was, what he meant, and whether or not he's actually "good" is a subject of much speculation by the fanbase.]] |
| 403 | ** The most common theory is said Ethereal is [[spoiler: Asaru from The Bureau, which is somewhat backed up by the ghostly Ethereals saying "Traitor!" in the end cinematic of the game.]] |
| 404 | * GreaterScopeVillain: [[spoiler:The ending implies that the Elders aren't the worst thing running roughshod over the universe, and they're not only shitting their pants in fear but all the atrocities they committed over the centuries were part of their attempt to fend it off. This in turn might put them into WellIntentionedExtremist territory and would make XCOM guilty of an unintentional NiceJobBreakingItHero. However, the Elders are the sole reason that thing is zeroing in on Earth in the first place, so at the very least they got their just dessert for roping yet another innocent world into their war.]] |
| 405 | * TheGuardsMustBeCrazy: Patrolling enemies and civilians have a marked "zone" where they can spot your troops, and breaking down doors and windows can cause you to lose concealment, too. Barring all that, however, you can: |
| 406 | ** Open and close doors in enemy line of sight. |
| 407 | ** Walk down the street out of cover. |
| 408 | ** Send your flying, humming drone to hack their hardware. |
| 409 | ** Go up and down ladders or power lines. |
| 410 | ** Throw round, grenade-shaped battle scanners. |
| 411 | ** Stay behind cover very still if an enemy wanders close and catches you in their line of sight. This won't bust you so long as you don't move or they don't accidentally (or [[TheAllSeeingAI intentionally]]) flank you, even if a park bench is the only thing between the two of you. |
| 412 | ** Use the grappling hook on the Spider or Wraith Suits. |
| 413 | ** Somehow, ADVENT consistently fails to notice the not exactly subtle approach of your Firebrand dropship whenever you swoop into a new AO. |
| 414 | ** Even when your concealment is already blown, pods of enemies that didn't participate in the opening skirmish won't activate until they can draw a line of sight on your forces. This means you can level the entire map (or even the whole Alien Facility in the respective mission type) with explosives while the remaining pods continue to merrily patrol the AO, just as long as you stay beyond their 27-tiles sight range or leave enough walls standing to block LOS. |
| 415 | ** Probably the most hilarious examples can be witnessed on prison break operations in ''War of the Chosen''. The patrolling guards there have massively reduced detection range of only a few tiles, enabling you to run past almost close enough to touch them without them noticing. |
| 416 | ** The most extreme example, however, is any encounter between the aliens and a Reaper in Shadow mode, a unique passive ability that reduces all enemies' detection range to exactly one tile. Sometimes your Reapers can literally run right through an ADVENT squad without being detected. |
| 417 | ** {{Inverted|Trope}} as well: The Guards Must Be Clairvoyant. Concealment is simply a means to set up good ambushes, rather than being outright able to sneak through entire missions, and the programmed behavior of the guards reflects this. They'll change their patrol paths specifically to trap a hidden operative into either staying still or blowing their cover despite not knowing of their existence, and they'll '''stop''' patrolling specifically to hang around that hidden operative if they get close enough. Sectopods can also use their AOE attack on a hidden operative they can't reveal. |
| 418 | ** Averted for the [[JumpJetPack Icarus Armor]]. It doesn't matter if an enemy has a line of sight on the wearer or not when you activate its special jump ability, ADVENT ''will'' notice your soldier careening through the sky on pillars of rocket fire. Don't use it until you don't care about your concealment any longer anyway. |
| 419 | * GuideDangIt: |
| 420 | ** The game has a quite useful waypoint mechanic that's not only not covered by the tutorial, it isn't even mentioned in the Avenger's archives or any other official handbook. For the uninitiated out there: holding Ctrl while issuing move orders lets you choose the path your operatives take to their destination, which allows you to steer them clear of environmental hazards or things that would break their concealment, like windows, doors or those annoying civilian squealers. |
| 421 | ** The game displays gameplay hints (including the waypoint mentioned above) on the loading screen when heading out on a mission. Unfortunately it displays them on the screen within the screen in the Skyranger and then zooms out, which makes them hard to read, especially on console. Worse, part of the tip is blocked by the soldiers sitting closest to the screen. |
| 422 | ** The game says that soldiers gain promotion by taking part in missions, and there is a perk from the Guerrilla Tactics School which gives bonus XP for kills. This leaves a few questions unanswered:\ |
| 423 | Do soldiers have to make kills to progress[[note]]no, but a soldier gets 30 XP for a kill[[/note]], or is it enough to show up on a mission?[[note]]yes: 60 XP for completing a mission (120 for a storyline mission); 20 XP bonus when no soldiers are killed.[[/note]]\ |
| 424 | Do different enemies give different amounts of XP?[[note]]No.[[/note]]\ |
| 425 | What are the amounts of XP required for promotion to each rank?[[note]]Only 90 XP for the first rank, but 300 for the next rank. After that each rank needs roughly 1.5 times as much XP as the previous one.[[/note]]\ |
| 426 | Try asking Google, because the game isn't saying. |
| 427 | ** A key part of managing the early-game difficulty is carefully choosing when to take story-related missions and objectives. The game never tells you that these missions or objectives don't actually expire unlike the regular missions. If you knew this right off the bat, you'd also know only to take them when you've had at least the first tier of squad size, weapon, and/or armor upgrades. Naturally, the game will pester you to do them as if they were extremely urgent. Some early-game examples: |
| 428 | *** ADVENT Blacksite assault: involves raiding large facility to steal a critical plot item, and will have you fighting at least a couple of dozen enemies, many more than the generic early-game missions. |
| 429 | *** ADVENT Officer Skulljack objective: causes a [[spoiler: Codex]] to spawn, and become a regular enemy in succeeding missions. A nightmare if you let it happen in the early game. |
| 430 | *** Operation Regal Beast (''Alien Hunters'' DLC): Ends with you fighting the Viper King. Completing it also enables the Alien Rulers to appear randomly in subsequent missions. |
| 431 | *** Operation Last Gift (''Shen's Last Gift'' DLC): Fight unlimited waves of mechanical enemies, and a Sectopod - ''with quite a bit of extra health as if those things weren't bad enough'' - at the end of the mission. |
| 432 | * GunAccessories: |
| 433 | ** ADVENT modular weapons technology, once researched, allows XCOM to attach a variety of accessories to the operatives' weapons (weapons in higher tiers can have more accessories attached). There are three tiers – regular, Advanced and Superior – and each makes the accessory's effect more pronounced. You can't equip two accessories of the same type, and unless you have the "Lock and Load" continent bonus, accessories are destroyed if you remove them from the weapon. The Chosen's weapons in ''War of the Chosen'' have fixed accessories by default. |
| 434 | *** Stocks make your operatives just barely accurate enough to do ScratchDamage even if they miss. |
| 435 | *** Scopes and {{Laser Sight}}s respectively improve accuracy and critical hit rate. The latter also has increased critical chance at closer ranges. |
| 436 | *** Expanded Magazines and Auto-loaders respectively increase the amount of ammo pips available for you to use per reload, and give you a number of free-action reloads per mission. |
| 437 | *** Repeaters give weapons a small percentage chance of [[InstantDeathBullet killing aliens instantly]] [[OneHitKill regardless of their current health]] (kills with the Repeater effect are marked in the user-interface with the word 'Executed!' and no damage number). |
| 438 | *** Hair-Triggers give a chance that shots become free actions. |
| 439 | ** On a purely aesthetic front, every single one of XCOM's guns has a tactical light on the front end, even the sniper rifles, and [[DevelopersForesight XCOM operatives are actually mindful of light discipline while Concealed]]. |
| 440 | * HalfHumanHybrids: The "Evolved" aliens all have a mix of alien and human features as a result of the Elders splicing them with human DNA. It's lampshaded in the Sectoid autopsy. |
| 441 | * HandWave: |
| 442 | ** The "Magnetic Weapons" research answers the question of why your soldiers originally use the inferior conventional weaponry rather than scavenging the superior ADVENT weaponry. The report states that [[SmartGun ADVENT Mag Rifles contain built-in scanners that can detect when a user without modified genetic sequences handles them]], and will self-destruct with lethal force if the unauthorized user tries to fire them. Besides, you're able to make armaments on par with ADVENT magnetic weapons by that point anyway. |
| 443 | ** Sabotage missions still require you to place X4 charges on a supporting column to take the facility down, even when ''[[EverythingBreaks everything but]]'' the support column has been leveled in the fighting. The facilities still include an underground portion, so the job will only be half-done unless you collapse it with those X4 charges. |
| 444 | * HarmlessLuminescence: Flashbangs will disorientate aliens and their allies, but [[FriendlyFireproof will do nothing to your own soldiers]]. |
| 445 | * HeavilyArmoredMook: Unlike the first game, armor can actually reduce damage, but this is far more significant to giant enemies than human-sized ones or XCOM troops. Sectopods and Andromedons in particular have massive armor scores that you'll need to [[ArmorPiercingAttack bypass]] or [[AntiArmor permanently reduce]] with special attacks if you want to put them down reasonably fast. |
| 446 | * HelmetsAreHardlyHeroic: Headwear in general is purely cosmetic, so you can send all your soldiers into battle bareheaded with no repercussions. |
| 447 | * HerdHittingAttack: Multiple examples, from the expected grenades and explosives, to psi-attacks that can hit multiple enemies and do more damage for lower Will scores, to the Codex's rift that will disable all weapons in an area and then create an explosion the next turn. |
| 448 | * HeroMustSurvive: |
| 449 | ** The Commander understandably must survive the one mission they appear in. [[spoiler:And the Commander-controlled Avatar must survive Operation Leviathan.]] |
| 450 | ** Lily Shen and the SPARK must survive Operation Last Gift. |
| 451 | ** Ditto for Bradford for Operation Regal Beast. |
| 452 | ** Elena "Outrider" Dragunova and Pratal Mox must both survive Operation Lost and Abandoned. Thankfully, they appear in separate segments of the mission so you don't have to protect both of them at once. Though considering how early in the game you're forced to do this mission if it's activated, they'll likely end up protecting your troops more than you'll end up protecting them. |
| 453 | * HeroUnit: |
| 454 | ** Like in the first game, giving certain names to your soldiers will turn them into PurposelyOverpowered [=XCOM=] Heroes. Known names include Creator/SidMeier and NPC from first game, Peter van Doorn. |
| 455 | ** Outside of cheats, though, there are also the canon appearances of both Bradford and Shen in the DLC battles and tutorial. Bradford uses a custom heavy machine gun, while Shen has a custom Gremlin. |
| 456 | ** [[spoiler: The Commander, inhabiting a powerful Avatar, personally partakes in the final assault against the aliens.]] |
| 457 | * HoistByHisOwnPetard: |
| 458 | ** [[spoiler:In the penultimate mission, XCOM hacked into ADVENT's broadcast network, replacing its latest global broadcast with a message revealing ADVENT's atrocity, triggering a global rebellion.]] |
| 459 | ** [[spoiler: Twofold when the Ethereals are defeated; Not only does XCOM turn one of the Avatars they've been trying so long to create against them, they do so via the same process the aliens used to turn the Commander into a surrogate general for ADVENT.]] |
| 460 | ** A Sectoid can easily pull defeat from the jaws of victory if their squad catches an XCOM soldier in the open. They'll often move first and mindspin the operative, potentially panicking them, which always results in them moving to cover. The later coin flip between hunkering down or shooting at an enemy (and even ''killing the Sectoid'') is just the cherry on top. |
| 461 | ** Don't overdo destruction of cover to expose the aliens, lest your own troops have nowhere to cower behind when advancing. |
| 462 | ** Vipers can get themselves killed by deciding that it's a good move to try to constrict one of your soldiers if they are successful but their target is a Ranger with Bladestorm. Packs of Chryssalids are prone to making the same error. Note that Bladestorm triggers once per in-range enemy, not once per turn. |
| 463 | ** Similar to Vipers (but exposing themselves to less danger), both Andromedons and Mutons prioritize melee against hordes of the Lost, probably to save ammo (...despite the existence of the Headshot mechanic) and getting easily swarmed and distracted. At least the Muton is practically invulnerable thanks to its counter attack. |
| 464 | ** Purifiers have a chance to blow up when they die to ''anything''. Including the Lost that they're often fighting. These explosions would then lead to more Lost swarming and overwhelming even these dedicated anti-Lost units. |
| 465 | ** The [=PsiOps=]' Fuse ability's sole purpose is to blow up any explosives the target is carrying. Mutons, [=MECs=] and many ADVENT troops including Officers carry grenades of varying power. You do the math. Fuse is unlikely to kill the target due to grenades' rather low damage, but even then it's quite useful since it prevents the target from using their grenades against your own troops. |
| 466 | ** The Templar resistance order Feedback makes psionic enemies suffer a nice amount of damage when they use any psionic ability against XCOM. This damage adds up for every unit hit, so when a Codex uses its Psionic Bomb (which it only does when at least two targets get hit, and often it's more than that), chances are good it'll instakill itself through the feedback pulse. |
| 467 | * HoldTheLine: If the Avenger is grounded as a result of the "Hunt XCOM" Dark Event, you will need to undertake a mission wherein you destroy the alien device preventing your escape, all the while keeping the alien forces from entering the Avenger. |
| 468 | * HollywoodAcid: Employed both by the aliens (specifically the Andromedon) and XCOM (in the form of acid grenades), as well as occasionally found as a map hazard (destructible chemical containers that will cause a spill of the stuff when damaged). It's green, it bubbles and hisses ominously and it melts even advanced alien materials into slag in a matter of seconds. |
| 469 | * HollywoodDarkness: Mechanically, there's no difference between nights in day or night, or whether your soldiers' lights are off (when concealed) or on (revealed). The only indication of light level in maps is a shift in lens tint (white or orange in daytime, bluish at night, and drab brown in tunnels or city ruins) and your operatives's weapon lights being on or off. |
| 470 | * {{Homage}}: Jake Solomon has said that the Chosen adaptive gaining of skills is inspired by ''VideoGame/MiddleEarthShadowOfMordor'''s Nemesis system. |
| 471 | * HubUnderAttack: Your mobile flying base is forced down by an EMP emitter and you have to destroy the emitter while fending off waves of enemy troops trying to board you. |
| 472 | * HumansAdvanceSwiftly: XCOM goes from using ballistic weapons to [[PlasmaCannon plasma weapons]] and from kevlar armor to PoweredArmor in a matter of ''months'', with MagneticWeapons and plated armor as springboards in between. All it takes is one OmnidisciplinaryScientist, one GadgeteerGenius, a dozen or so support personnel, and a handful of resources. Granted, all of XCOM's new tech is reverse-engineered from alien equipment, but even this approach would take many years in RealLife to produce anything remotely field-ready. The imminent [[spoiler:destruction of the entire human race]] is probably a quite powerful motivator. |
| 473 | * HumansAreSpecial: Humans as a race occupy a sweet spot of both physical, mental and psychic ability, to the point where most pre-existing alien race have been made better through the addition of Human DNA: Sectoids are stronger, more durable and boast improved psychic powers; Mutons are more agile and smarter; this even extends to [[spoiler:the Ethereals, whose half-human Avatars are outright deadly and the entire reason for them to single out humanity for conquest]]. Especially notable since Enemy Unknown indicates the Ethereals took all their servant races to the absolute limit of their genetic and cybernetic potential, all of them resulting in dead ends. . . until, in this game, human DNA was added to the mix. |
| 474 | * HumanResources: |
| 475 | ** It's nothing new considering that it was implied in the previous game that some humans were turned into [[IAmAHumanitarian alien food]], but humans are shown to being broken down into some sort of green slime (most likely to be used in the Gene Clinics) in the [=ADVENT=] Black Site mission. |
| 476 | ** As the plot progresses, it is ultimately found out that the processing system is [[spoiler:(also) used to search the human genome for a potential cure of the Ethereals' body atrophy, as well as to produce the Avatars that were intended to become their new hosts.]] |
| 477 | ** And from a gameplay perspective, your experienced soldiers are often the most precious resource ''you'' have as well. Start losing too many troops and Bradford will advise you to pull out of a difficult mission, and it may be to your advantage to do so (recovering bodies as you go so you don't lose their unique equipment as well). Fortunately, the game lets you replace a deceased experienced soldier at a high price. |
| 478 | ** Dr. Tygan mentions that the one thing he misses from ADVENT's cities is the burgers, that are really good. Though he wonders where they found the meat and doesn't like to think about it too much... especially since Lily notes that ''all the cows are gone''. However, given the scale of which ADVENT can clone and manufacture organic creatures, it's far more likely they're just growing meat in vats. One of the random events on the Cityscape involves a Burger Production facility, with the troops sent there report that there's no source for meat. [[spoiler: ''[[VideoGame/{{XCOMChimeraSquad}} Chimera Squad]]'' potentially [[SubvertedTrope subverts]] this as a burger chain implied to be a rebranded ADVENT Burger reveals their burgers are made with kelp proteins.]] |
| 479 | ** {{Inverted}} throughout the course of the game, as you build equipment that explicitly uses material taken from '''aliens''', such as harvesting Viper venom to make nanomedikit upgrades or Chryssalid scales for armor upgrades. The ''Alien Hunter'' DLC takes it even further, as you actually turn the Ruler Aliens' corpses into armor. |
| 480 | [[/folder]] |
| 481 | |
| 482 | [[folder:I - R]] |
| 483 | * ICallItVera: The player is able to customize and name weapons that the operatives use. If the user happens to [[AnyoneCanDie die]], the weapon can be retrieved and given to another operative to use. |
| 484 | * IdiosyncraticMechaStorage: One of the activation animations of the [=MECs=] has them rising from a ball and powering up. Can look silly depending on what the MEC did right before the animation. |
| 485 | * ImprovisedArmor: The Resistance Warrior DLC gives new options for the basic game armor - one of them is a suit made of scavenged components and chunks of ADVENT Armor (with an XCOM logo spray painted over the ADVENT logo on the shoulder). |
| 486 | * InTheHood: Hoods are now an option for your Operatives to wear. In ''War of the Chosen'', the Chosen Hunter wears a hood, and the Reapers always have a hood, sometimes covering a gas mask. |
| 487 | * InfernalRetaliation: Hellfire Weave is an armor underlay that is guaranteed to light melee attackers on fire--the importance there is that an enemy on fire can do very little except move or shoot, and their melee attacks are disabled. If you put it on a Ranger with the intercepting Bladestorm, equipped with a plasma blade (also a good chance of setting enemies on fire) then most aliens that try to strike them will burn for their troubles. |
| 488 | * InformedAbility: Averted for the first time in the series. Previous games somewhat infamously ran into the problem of presenting your useless, inexperienced rookies as hand-picked elite special forces. Now, since you're playing as a ragtag resistance movement, your useless, inexperienced rookies are ''just that'', consisting almost exclusively of civilian volunteers from a [[RagtagBunchOfMisfits variety]] of [[ArmyOfThievesAndWhores backgrounds]]. |
| 489 | * InfinityPlusOneSword: All of the reward weapons for defeating the Chosen are a grade or two stronger than anything else you can come up with through research or the Proving Grounds. They deal as much damage - if not more - as fully upgraded tier 3 weapons and come pre-loaded with ''four'' Superior-grade weapon attachments. And they all carry very potent bonus effects on top of it all. |
| 490 | ** The Darklance is a sniper rifle which removes the biggest limitation on Sharpshooters. Normally, using a sniper rifle requires both of the Sharpshooter's actions, forcing them to remain in place in exchange for a highly-accurate, damaging, long-range shot. The Darklance, however, only takes a single action point, giving Snipers all of the mobility afforded to other soldiers without any sacrifices in their extreme range, aim, or damage. This can be further augmented with the Sharpshooter's Death From Above ability, which refunds an action point when they score a kill shot... that can be used to fire the Darklance again, and again, and again. |
| 491 | ** The Darkclaw is a massive upgrade to the regular pistol, dealing more damage than a fully-upgraded beam pistol while simultaneously piercing nearly all enemy armor, while ''still'' able to benefit from ammunition bonuses such as Bluescreen Rounds. |
| 492 | ** The Arashi, which has all of the raw stopping power of a Shotgun without the heavy range penalties. |
| 493 | ** The [[KatanasAreJustBetter Katana]] is the Ranger's equivalent of the Darkclaw - a side melee weapon which deals more damage than other swords in the game, never misses, and pierces enemy armor. |
| 494 | ** And the Disruptor Rifle, which takes the Assault Rifle and adds a guaranteed critical hit against any psionic enemies, up to and including dangerous endgame enemies such as Gatekeepers and [[spoiler:Avatars]]. |
| 495 | * InterfaceScrew: Any large enough explosion will cause the UI to briefly flicker with static, which are typically caused by your Grenadier soldiers. |
| 496 | * InterfaceSpoiler: |
| 497 | ** Several during combat: |
| 498 | *** Once again, the fact that you can't move into tiles occupied by enemies can help you locate hostiles or civilians you don't have a line of sight to. |
| 499 | *** When in concealment, you'll sometimes be able to see the "spotted" tiles from enemy pods you haven't discovered yet. |
| 500 | *** Normally, you can issue a move order to your units and select a different one before the unit actually finishes moving, which is convenient when you're trying to move many of them at the same time. However, if something (such as activating an alien group, breaking concealment, or getting a message from Central) will be triggered during your unit's movement you will not be able to do this as the camera will follow the unit until the triggered event occurs, serving as an early warning. |
| 501 | *** During Retaliation Missions, Faceless infiltrators disguised as Resistance members can be picked out by the simple fact that the aliens will not actively attack them. The disguised Faceless are also much less likely to flee when ADVENT units get close to them, making them stand out even more. |
| 502 | ** Since the outcome of the game actions is largely decided by the RNG, the calculations are completed in the first few milliseconds and everything else is simply suspense. The result is that Steam Achievements can pop up for feats like "hack an enemy" when you were sweating over the low percentage of a success, or you'll be notified "Soldier Promoted" before you've even discovered the enemy who's about to enter your overwatch. |
| 503 | ** It also averts the previous game's example, as the cinematic camera triggers on most shots, even if the shot will miss. |
| 504 | ** [[spoiler: The Avatar Base icon appears in the Pacific Ocean, informing you how close the aliens are to completing the Avatar Project. No one knows where the Avatar Base is, and Shen speculates the Psi Gate that leads to it is showing them a location not on Earth. It's finally revealed, in literally the last room, that the Avatar Base was underwater the entire time.]] |
| 505 | ** Even if you haven't beaten the Lost Towers mission and unlocked SPARK, the existence of the SPARK equipment in the loadout choices gives the game away. |
| 506 | ** One of the helmet customization options from ''Alien Hunters'' DLC is [[spoiler:"Avatar"]], which pretty much spoils out their appearance later on. |
| 507 | * ItOnlyWorksOnce: |
| 508 | ** ''War of the Chosen'' adds the ability to Revitalise a soldier, allowing them to be temporarily healed and cleared of fatigue so they can be brought on a mission. As the trope suggests, this can only be done once per soldier per campaign. |
| 509 | ** Also from [=WotC=], the three Chosen strongholds, once discovered by your spies and allies, can only be attacked once. If the assault fails, the Chosen fortifies the hole in their defenses XCOM used to sneak in, and you'll have to contend with their constant meddling for the rest of the campaign. |
| 510 | * JumpScare: ''Very'' effectively used: [[spoiler: the autopsy of the first Avatar you kill starts off like any other autopsy, with Tygan providing his thoughts and a low camera angle with occasional blood splatters. Then ''a ghostly Ethereal comes out of the body'' and the camera angle slowly moves to show it disappointed in the Avatar and humanity in general, with Tygan watching it.]] Since none of the previous similar scenes were any different, it comes as a shock to see that this normally static and darkly humorous scene is ''much more'' than how it initially presents. |
| 511 | * JustifiedTutorial: While it can be skipped (especially by those who wants absolutely zero casualties), the tutorial level has some significant part of the background story. |
| 512 | * KatanasAreJustBetter: |
| 513 | ** With ''War of the Chosen'' installed, the Assassin's Katana may look nothing like an actual katana but is still far and away the most powerful melee weapon in the game, sporting the highest damage rating, {{Always Accurate Attack}}s and AbsurdCuttingPower that ignores up to five armor pips. |
| 514 | ** The Advanced Blade that's part of the ''Tactical Legacy Pack'' plays it completely straight by being the top-tier Ranger sword ''and'' actually looking like a katana. The kick-ass green plasma glow along its cutting edge is just icing on the cake. |
| 515 | * KillItWithFire: Incendiary grenades are available, and later flamethrowers can be attached to heavy armor. The Hellweave vest sets any melee attacker on fire that lands a hit on the wearer. Last but not least, ''War of the Chosen'' adds Purifiers, armored soldiers toting flamethrowers ''and'' incendiary grenades, to ADVENT's troop roster. |
| 516 | * LampshadeHanging: Bradford has an InUniverse reference to most annoying sound, when he mentions the common perception that he never shuts up when he observes that the Chosen are even more talkative than he is. |
| 517 | * LargeHam: |
| 518 | ** While your soldiers occasionally break out the pork when using their skills, the Psionic units all have them beat. [[PersonOfMassDestruction Psi-Operatives]], [[MagicKnight Templars]], and [[AxCrazy the]] [[PsychoSupporter Warlock]] [[TheFundamentalist Chosen]] are over the top, [[ChewingTheScenery chewing whatever scenery their psionics leave undamaged]]. |
| 519 | --->'''Psi-Operative (casting Inspire):''' ''I AM WITH YOU!''\ |
| 520 | '''Templar (casting Rend):''' ''Feel the power of the Templars!!'' |
| 521 | ** Lampshaded by the Hunter even: |
| 522 | --->'''The Hunter:''' If you ask me, these Templars are just as crazy as my brother. What is it about Psionic energy that seems to drive them so completely mad? |
| 523 | * TheLawOfDiminishingDefensiveEffort: Just like in the previous game, the aliens that can't TakeCover are those that are so hardy they don't need to, or they have innate Defence that confers the same advantage anyway. Or both. You also don't get the 40% bonus to critical hit chance that flanking normally does. |
| 524 | ** Subverted by the Berserker variant of Mutons. They actually '''turn on their pod''' if you score two consecutive hits on them when they are not in cover. It's actually easier for the player when Berserkers arrive. |
| 525 | * LeaveNoWitnesses: |
| 526 | ** Subverted as far as concealment is concerned. Even when your troops successfully kill a pod of aliens from ambush and there are no visible hostiles left over, your Concealment is blown for the rest of the mission. |
| 527 | ** Played straight for most missions in general. Even if your primary objective is achieved, you still have to kill everything hostile on the map. Central usually gives a reason for it, and sometimes it's this trope. |
| 528 | * LibertyOverProsperity: The cities are clean, organised and the residents have access to the advanced medical care and food but many people choose to live in ramshackle shantytowns because they are outside of ADVENT's iron-fisted control. [[spoiler: ADVENT responds to their desire for liberty by raiding their camps and killing everyone they can find.]] |
| 529 | * LimitedLoadout: As usual for the franchise, soldiers always carry exactly one primary and one secondary weapon into battle. Furthermore, all classes except the Ranger are limited to one specific loadout that can be upgraded but not changed[[note]]although there are, of course, mods to remedy this[[/note]]: |
| 530 | ** Ranger: shotgun or assault rifle, sword |
| 531 | ** Sharpshooter: sniper rifle, handgun |
| 532 | ** Grenadier: cannon, grenade launcher |
| 533 | ** Specialist: assault rifle, [[RobotBuddy Gremlin]] |
| 534 | ** Psi Operative: assault rifle, psi amp |
| 535 | ** Reaper: Vektor sniper rifle, claymore mines |
| 536 | ** Skirmisher: bullpup rifle, [[BladeBelowTheShoulder Ripjack]] |
| 537 | ** Templar: [[LaserBlade shard gauntlets]], autopistol |
| 538 | * LoadsAndLoadsOfLoading: When first released, the default game was rather unoptimized, which led to longer than expected but still tolerable loading times. Still, there were two odd results from this: players discovering a shortcut to bypass the loading process on PC, and a coding error which extended loading times severely for each mod that was enabled. In addition, the [=PS4=] version of the game was poorly optimized, leading to lengthy loading times for its port. ''War of the Chosen'' massively decreases the loading times. |
| 539 | * LoweredRecruitingStandards: ImpliedTrope. XCOM from ''VideoGame/XCOMEnemyUnknown'' was a military organization that had troopers who had at least all passed boot camp. After the aliens won, going from the randomly generated soldier backstories (going from former vets to random civilians attempting some CarFu against ADVENT security checkpoints to people rumored to have been inmates in high security prisons), the requirements to be an XCOM trooper dropped to "hate the aliens for one reason or another" and "being able to hold a rifle". |
| 540 | * LuckBasedMission: |
| 541 | ** ''Every'' mission is this thanks to a combination of ProceduralGeneration and the RandomNumberGod. If you're lucky, the map spawns you near (or on top of) a tall building with good sight lines on your objectives and enemies. If you're not, you may find yourself forced to navigate an urban maze where turning any corner could have you run straight into one or more pods, or you get a wide open map with hardly any cover for your soldiers near the objective. Even if the map generator was on your side, you can still have a hard time making headway when your soldiers stubbornly refuse to hit the broad side of a barn despite their 90+% hit chance. |
| 542 | ** Also applies to the campaign as a whole. A lot of weapons and armor technologies require specific alien corpses for research and/or construction, so if you either don't encounter these aliens in the first place or only fight them in extraction missions that don't allow you to salvage corpses for Tygan to dissect, your tech development can end up stymied by factors beyond your control for a dangerous amount of time. Sharpshooters, Psi Ops and Specialists suffer the most from this effect due to their top-tier equipment depending entirely on the successful salvaging of rare late-game enemies. |
| 543 | ** ''War of the Chosen'' can further add to your luck-based woes. It doesn't happen ''often'', but if a Chosen spawns near a VIP that you have to rescue, then good luck getting across the map and putting the bastard down before they one-shot your entire mission. (Of course, any difficult mission can be made even worse when the Chosen decide to spawn, but usually their appearances aren't so egregiously unfair as this particular example.) |
| 544 | ** In [=WoTC=], your soldiers can get skills from other classes in the newly-added third skill tree. However, the skills from this tree are randomized for each soldier, making it possible for you to get either completely useless skills you wouldn't even pick on their original classes or totally broken combinations (like Serial + Death From Above + Chain Shot + Dead Eye on a Ranger) that trivialize the rest of the game. |
| 545 | * MagikarpPower: |
| 546 | ** Again, the rookies you start off with have the aim of a stormtrooper and often panic as soon as a shot grazes them, but given enough experience they'll eventually grow into the finest warriors Earth has to offer. |
| 547 | ** The Specialist's Gremlin, at least in terms of attack. The Mark I's combat protocol ignores armor, but only deals a measly 2 damage (4 against robots), useful only if your last barrage left an enemy with a sliver of health. The Mark II upgrades it to a slightly more useful 4 damage, but guaranteed 8 damage against robotic enemies can quickly finish off a MEC after an average attack instead of focusing your entire squad on it. By the time the Mark III rolls off the assembly line, its 6 damage is basically a standard, unavoidable attack, regular [=MECs=] can be One-Hit Killed by the 12-damage shock, and Heavy [=MECs=] and Sectopods will wish they were programmed to retreat. |
| 548 | ** Psi-Operatives play with this trope to hell and back. Sure, they may start off as fresh rookies, but the fact that their continuous training method disregards combat means they don't need to risk injury, potentially missing out chances for training like your regular soldiers or even getting killed. It takes time, zero effort, and a month or two of training, but your psi-operative's first combat experience can have them more dangerous than even hardened veterans. |
| 549 | ** As of ''War of the Chosen'', Templars without their unique Focus resource are mostly useless. Kill a few things to build up their Focus and they become fairly effective. Get a Templar promoted to colonel and suddenly you have a versatile psionic murder machine that can one-shot most infantry in melee, has very powerful crowd-control abilities, can support your team in a variety of ways and generally raise more hell on the battlefield than almost any other class. |
| 550 | * MauveShirt: Irish Jane Kelly continues the Argentine Heavy's tradition of surviving the tutorial mission and being your first promoted soldier (a Ranger). And as per the trope, you can still get her killed in say, the first mission after that, of course. Her popularity led to the Chosen referring to her by name in the expansion. [[spoiler:And she's SavedByCanon, appearing in ''VideoGame/XCOMChimeraSquad''.]] |
| 551 | * MinMaxersDelight: Dark Events that appear every month are normally meant to increase the difficulty of missions unless they're countered. However, there are some whose consequences are mild to non-existent. These events are usually considered a free-card when it comes to deciding which of the few events of the month to counter: |
| 552 | ** A dark event has Faceless appear in every mission, which is actually ''beneficial'' to the player. Faceless are mostly harmless and are used to create Mimic Beacons, making the event a ''huge'' boon to someone in the early game or on Legendary and/or Ironman. Civilians are usually best avoided in guerilla operations anyway. |
| 553 | ** The Midnight Raids dark event. It simply doubles the cost of recruits, but since most people intend on preserving their starting pool of soldiers, this is a non-factor almost all the time. Even with Ironman or for players who don't save scum if an outcome is "good enough", this is a non-factor because you can just recruit more soldiers before this goes into effect if you see needing more. |
| 554 | ** Introduced in War of the Chosen is Lost World, enabling The Lost to appear on just about any mission even without the appropriate [=SitReps=]. The Lost themselves aren't too hectic to deal with. |
| 555 | ** Undying Loyalty from War of the Chosen gives ADVENT units a chance to revive as Psi Zombies on death. Considering the fact that Psi Zombies have ''less'' health than most late-game ADVENT units, this isn't that big of a deal. |
| 556 | ** ADVENT Sealed Armor isn't too much of a fuss, as it only affects the proper ADVENT units, rather than the tougher alien enemies. People don't usually consider ADVENT grunts to be worth wasting ice bombs on. |
| 557 | ** Collateral Damage and Return Fire aren't much of a factor to those who intend to kill first, let the enemy attack never. |
| 558 | * ModularDifficulty: The expansion ''War of the Chosen'' has its own "Advanced Options" for difficulty, some of which address player complaints about the base game being too focused on a hard time limit (both the Avatar Project and timers in missions can be expanded using these options). There's also an option to expand health pools, and three options to start with one of the resistance cells (Reapers, Skirmishers or Templars) already in contact with XCOM. |
| 559 | * MookMaker: there's no enemy that directly creates new enemies, but the Gatekeeper's "Gateway" ability, in addition to harming all hostile targets in the (massive) area of effect, also revives any dead ADVENT or alien troops, as a kind of mass "Psi Zombie" ability similar to the Sectoid ability. This bad enough in the base game, but in ''War of the Chosen'', the effect can also work on [[OhCrap the Lost, without limit]], and since the Lost show up half a dozen at a time and swarm towards a particular area... |
| 560 | ** The Chosen can develop abilities that let them spawn ADVENT soldiers, from basic Troopers, to Lancers, to Priests, two at a time. They generally will only use the ability once per mission, but they ''will'' use the ability once per mission if they're able. |
| 561 | * MultinationalTeam: XCOM is still made up of many different nationalities, and the soldier's armor again displays their country's flag. This time however there is a greater variety in accents to differentiate them, and you are also able to change a soldier's nationality in character customisation. Your XCOM members still wearing national flags on their uniforms is a point of defiance for them. The Elders have done their best to wipe out all old governments and encourage humans to use their alien language. XCOM's members proudly display their old national heritage. |
| 562 | * MundaneUtility: Elerium crystals are normally used as high-density power sources in most of ADVENT's and XCOM's advanced technology. The black market dealer recommends mixing them with coffee as a pick-me-up. |
| 563 | * MutuallyExclusivePowerups: There are seven different GunAccessories available in the game, but XCOM weapons can only accept a maximum of six[[note]]three without mods[[/note]] at once because scopes and laser sights occupy the same slot, forcing you to choose between better aim or better crit chance. The only exception is Central's unique, ridiculously overmodded Multipurpose Assault Rifle that sports both optics mounted in line, with the laser sight in front of the scope. |
| 564 | ** In the base game, you can only choose one skill at each rank-up for each soldier (for example, Blast Padding and Shredder, the Corporal-level upgrades for Grenadiers, normally cannot be chosen together). However, ''War Of The Chosen'' gives you the option of making your soldiers skilled in ''all'' abilities, by using the Training Center and spending skill points to purchase skills that normally are mutually exclusive, at the cost of a serious and non-refundable loss in skill points if the soldier dies. |
| 565 | ** Completely averted with Psi Operatives in all versions of the game: while they can only choose from three (random) skills to learn from Psi training, if you're willing to spend enough time, they can learn '''every''' Psi ability. |
| 566 | * MyRulesAreNotYourRules: The unique units introduced in the ''Alien Hunters'' DLC are designed to specifically mess with the rules of the game as you know them. To whit: |
| 567 | ** All rulers get an action for every ''action'' you get, and they get to take it ''immediately afterwards''[[labelnote:*]]That is, every time one of your soldiers does something that isn't a free action (such as Lightning Hands) the Ruler can see, the Ruler will get to immediately react to it[[/labelnote]]. |
| 568 | ** All rulers have unique, never-before-seen abilities, including the Viper King's freeze attack, and the Berserker Queen's smash attack (which is an AOE GroundPound, unlike the Berserker's smash). |
| 569 | ** All rulers, in addition to their "interrupt" actions, also get their regular actions on their turn, and they can move much farther than their base unit. |
| 570 | ** Rulers don't care about your Overwatch status if it's not their turn: if they trigger a reaction move, then they will not be shot by any of your soldiers in Overwatch. |
| 571 | ** Rulers are not immune to burning, acid, etc., but they aren't ''hindered'' by them either: while normal units cannot fight effectively while on fire, Rulers can. |
| 572 | * MysticalWhiteHair: It seems to be associated with psionic potential, since soldiers who receive Psi training automatically change their hair color to white (though this can be changed later in the Customize menu). [[spoiler: This also applies for the Avatars and the Warlock]]. |
| 573 | * MythologyGag: |
| 574 | ** The ''Avenger'' starship is named after the aircraft required to take your troops to Mars in the original ''VideoGame/{{XCOM}}''. [[spoiler: Also the last mission of ''VideoGame/XCOMEnemyUnknown''.]] |
| 575 | ** The new Viper breed of aliens are clearly a CallBack to the Snakemen race of the original ''VideoGame/{{XCOM}}''. |
| 576 | ** One of the files in the Commander's quarters says that the XCOM Project was formed in 1993, the same year that [[VideoGame/{{XCOM}} X-COM : UFO Defense]] came out. |
| 577 | ** The photo for the "Recover Advent loot" resistance operation is styled after the buy/sell/hire/sack screen from UFO Defense, with the brief case containing an artifact as opposed to money. |
| 578 | ** [[spoiler:The final mission takes place in an underwater base akin to ''Terror From The Deep'', and the final cutscene (an ominous glow rising from a crack in the ocean floor) is somewhat reminiscent of that game as well]]. |
| 579 | ** [[spoiler:In Enemy Unknown, the final mission was called Operation Avenger, the name of the aforementioned final transport ship in UFO Defense. In this game, the final mission is called Operation Leviathan, the same name as the final transport from Terror From The Deep.]] |
| 580 | ** [[spoiler:Avatars]] resemble soldiers in ''VideoGame/XCOMUFODefense'' in personal armour, right down to the AnimeHair. |
| 581 | * NecessaryDrawback: |
| 582 | ** The different types of armour. Heavy armours give the most health, Armour points and a heavy weapon mount. Light armours give the least health but give mobility increases, dodge chance and a GrapplingHookPistol. Medium armours offer a moderate health boost, a second utility item slot and only need one purchase to unlock the next tier for everyone, whereas the other two types need to be crafted one suit at a time from the Proving Grounds. |
| 583 | ** Moves that increase damage, like the Sharpshooter's Deadeye, or allow for two attacks with one move, like the Ranger's Rapid Fire, suffer an aim penalty. |
| 584 | ** Moves that let you attack multiple times a turn have some kind of drawback, though it varies; for example, Kill Zone allows Overwatch shots against everyone that moves but only in a small cone, while Reaper deducts one damage for each kill made. |
| 585 | ** Breakthroughs in ''War of the Chosen'' ''must'' be researched as your next project: if you don't purse the breakthrough immediately, it disappears. But researching a breakthrough can delay your other, potentially life-saving advances: you have to decide if it's worth putting off Magnetic Weapons for another 7 days to get +1 damage to all rifles for the rest of the game, for example. |
| 586 | * {{Necromancer}}: Virtually all psionic enemies have the ability to raise the recently deceased as zombies. Gatekeepers are the masters of this by virtue of doing this to a huge area, potentially raising half a dozen or more powerful new enemies in just one turn if you're unlucky. Fortunately, [[NoOntologicalInertia if you kill the psionic, its zombies also die]]. Unfortunately, XCOM psi operatives can't learn this particular trick, likely for moral reasons given the tone with which Bradford addresses the first psi zombie in a campaign. |
| 587 | * {{Nerf}}: |
| 588 | ** The March 2016 Patch makes the Mimic Beacon a lot less durable, as it can no longer dodge attacks or use cover. It also costs more resources to make. |
| 589 | ** The May 2016 patch removed the ability for the repeater's {{one hit kill}} effect to trigger off of the stock's {{scratch damage}} effect or any damage over time effect. |
| 590 | * NiceJobBreakingItHero: |
| 591 | ** [[spoiler: The Elders accuse XCOM of this, since they were ''apparently'' using the Avatar project to beat back a GreaterScopeVillain.]] |
| 592 | ** Can happen in the protect the data tap missions. Data taps are guaranteed hits without needing to check for accuracy. If you lower a foe's aim via disorientation, Suppression or something else and it has line of sight to the data tap, it may decide to attack the easier-to-hit data tap instead. |
| 593 | * NintendoHard: It wouldn't be an [=XCOM=] game without difficulty. Most of the enemies are even more deadly than their original counterparts, many missions are on a strict time limit, and resources for advanced equipment are harder to find, making this game just as challenging as ''Enemy Unknown''. |
| 594 | * NoHarmRequirement: The Spokesman will give you special guerrilla missions from time to time. Half of them require you to rescue a scientist or engineer. The other half require you to kidnap a VIP without killing them. To do so you can knock them out and carry them to the evacuation point, with the carrying soldier unable to do anything besides running[[note]]or you can just have your Psi Operative MindControl the VIP and let them walk to the evac zone on their own[[/note]]. If you think you are unable to take them alive you are allowed to shoot them, but this will greatly reduce your payout for the mission and get you reprimanded by the Spokesman. |
| 595 | * NoSavingThrow: The Assassin's Katana and the Bolt Caster's quarrels cannot be dodged for reduced damage. |
| 596 | * NonIndicativeName: |
| 597 | ** The Assassin's unique melee weapon, the so-called Katana, has absolutely nothing in common with an actual katana aside from being a sword. |
| 598 | ** Sectopods got their name because XCOM soldiers believed the things were being piloted by a Sectoid. Turned out Sectopods are completely autonomous {{Killer Robot}}s once they got a chance to take one apart, but the name stuck regardless. |
| 599 | * NonStandardGameOver: Fail the Avenger Defense mission, and [[TheBadGuyWins ADVENT invades and ends the XCOM campaign]]. |
| 600 | * NoOntologicalInertia: |
| 601 | ** Enemies raised as zombies by sectoids die if the sectoid who created them dies. A mind-controlled unit returns to your control if the controlling alien dies. |
| 602 | ** Mind controlled aliens are also freed if the controlling Psi Operative dies or leaves the field via evac. Same for hacked ADVENT robots if the specialist who hacked them dies or evacs. |
| 603 | ** Same for panic effect. It is the reason it is often just a free uncontrollable turn. If you can kill the Sectoid that caused panic or move a Psionic operative with Solace in range, you get a full turn, even if you just moved and shot at the alien's turn. |
| 604 | ** Annoyingly averted by the ADVENT Priests' Stasis ability. Killing the priest will not cancel the stasis field they probably trapped one of your operatives in. You have to wait out the full turn to resume control of any affected troops. |
| 605 | ** Averted with the Archeon's Pinion attack. The pinions are launched in one turn, and land (and explode) in the next turn. Killing the Archeon after he launches the pinions won't stop the pinions from hitting. |
| 606 | ** ZigZagged at the end of the game. [[spoiler: Like the previous game, you win as soon as you kill the boss enemies, but even though your squad's escape isn't hampered by any non-Ethereal aliens, the Avatar's mooks don't visually perish like before. Finally, even with the Ethereals gone and much exposition how their soldiers are dependent on their psi-network, ADVENT forces continue to fight on despite the psi-network's destruction (though they're obviously fighting a losing war)]]. |
| 607 | * NoOneGetsLeftBehind: |
| 608 | ** Carrying your fallen soldiers is now a gameplay feature, either to get them to safety if they're unconscious or hurt, or to retrieve their equipment if they're KIA. |
| 609 | ** If a critically wounded or unconscious soldier is left behind, they're marked as Captured. This means that there's a chance (but not a guarantee) that a future mission will appear in which you can rescue them, with their skills and equipment intact. |
| 610 | * NotTheIntendedUse: You can [[MindControl dominate an enemy VIP]] in the capture VIP missions and have them walk to the EVAC zone. |
| 611 | * NoSell: |
| 612 | ** Rangers can learn the ability "Untouchable," where the first alien attack next turn is a guaranteed miss, if the Ranger scored a kill that turn. Doesn't matter if the attack is a poisonous cloud, a Muton bayonet, or as Sectopod's squad-wiping WaveMotionGun, your Ranger will ignore it. Any following shots are fair game, however. Untouchable can be refreshed via Overwatch kills. If you are lucky, an experienced Ranger can chain through the alien turn. Of course, [[ArtificialStupidity aliens have to cooperate.]] |
| 613 | ** The Psi-Operative's "Fortress" ability, which makes them outright immune to most status hazards like Fire, Poison, Acid and Explosions. "Solace" ability does the same with mind-affecting enemy psionics for the [=PsiOp=] and any allies in a generous radius. A [=PsiOp=] can have both, leaving direct-damage psionics and gunfire the only things they need to worry about. |
| 614 | ** The Templar's "Parry" ability allows them to block the next attack directed at them after performing a Rend, as well as "Deflect" which gives them a chance of stopping ranged attacks as long as they have focus. If they get lucky they may even get the Psi-Operative's "Fortress" as one of their extra ability options. |
| 615 | * ObligatoryEarpieceTouch: In the opening cinematic, Bradford always touches his ear when he's speaking on comms to the other members of his covert operation. At one point, he does it while standing face to face with an ADVENT trooper, who doesn't appear to notice what he's doing. |
| 616 | * ObviousRulePatch: |
| 617 | ** In the previous game, Squadsight snipers bordered on Game Breaking levels of effectiveness, as their mechanic of "more distance = more accuracy" resulted in players leaving them far behind the lines, picking off enemies in front of their hunkered down spotters, in a perfectly safe and utterly unspectacular strategy. Squadsight is now inherent to the equivalent class, but now snipers receive an aim '''penalty''' scaling with extreme range plus a flat crit chance penalty when using Squadsight, so the strategy of letting your unreachable marksman pick off every target from the start point is no longer a reliable tactic. |
| 618 | ** During beta testing, the popular streamer Beaglerush discovered a counter-intuitive method that led to extremely successful ambushes: [[ViolationOfCommonSense leaving a soldier out in plain sight]] for enemies to stumble upon while the rest of the squad sits on Overwatch. Since enemies would only move, not attack, as concealment was broken, you got to attack them while they're out of cover like in a regular ambush (minus the small Overwatch accuracy penalty) but the enemy effective wastes their first post-ambush turn. Firaxis promptly enabled enemies to attack ''immediately'' when concealment was broken on their turn, so attempting that strategy now risks the aliens simply [[WhyDontYaJustShootHim firing upon]] the defenseless trooper. |
| 619 | ** Sometime later, Beagle then discovered that the Sharpshooter's "Kill-Zone" ability triggers even if the Sharpshooter is concealed, and promptly resurrected his old tactic in full force. Again, Firaxis then went and changed Kill-Zone such that it respects the normal rules for concealed Overwatch and thus will not trigger until the squad has been revealed. |
| 620 | ** Mimic Beacons were game-breakingly powerful at launch as the decoy could utilize cover and also inherited defense and dodge stats from the soldier that deployed it. Player could also use other defense-boosting abilities and items (such as Specialist's Defense Protocol or Smoke Grenades) on them. Since AI always focuses on the decoy, aliens wasted their entire turn shooting it even when their hit chances were pathetically low, essentially making the item a Get Out of Jail Free -card. First major patch made attacks against decoys guaranteed to hit, thus significantly nerfing them. |
| 621 | ** In War of the Chosen, two new units are added to the enemy pool that nerfed the complacent gamer's strategy of "overwatch camp against all enemy groups": Spectres and Purifiers. Spectres turn into a cloud of nanomachines when moving, giving them Lightning Reflexes to dodge the first overwatch shot against them. Purifiers, meanwhile, made it dangerous to overwatch camp too close to enemy groups, as they have a chance to explode upon death. Purifiers can drop down from enemy reinforcement flares too, unlike Spectres, and greatly disincentive the old tactic of "move a Ranger with Bladestorm into the middle of a flare, and watch everything get cut up at close range". \ |
| 622 | \ |
| 623 | Interestingly, there were already units that tried to avert overwatch camping ([=MECs=] that stand still and overwatch, and the occasional Codex splitting up). Now, the new Templar units can acquire both Bladestorm and Fortress (rendering them immune to explosions and safely camping Purifiers) if they get lucky. |
| 624 | * OccupiersOutOfOurCountry: XCOM's members are fighting to free their homelands as much as they are freeing humanity. |
| 625 | * TheOmniscientCouncilOfVagueness: The shadowy Council of Nations that gave XCOM their marching orders makes a return, now represented by The Informant (AKA the Council Spokesman). |
| 626 | * OneHitKill: |
| 627 | ** The Repeater modification gives the weapon it's attached to a (admittedly very small) chance to instantly kill its target on a hit. The developers said that this applies to any target, from the basic ADVENT Trooper to the Berserker. It also works on robotic enemies (Including the sectopod, basically a giant WalkingTank). It even works on the chosen, which, if you're lucky, can make any encounter of them much easier. (There's even cases where they get insta–killed on the "assault the chosen" missions, allowing you to get rid of them FOR THE REST OF THE GAME. [[spoiler:It even works on the Avatars during the final Mission, and the [[KingMook Ruler Enemies]].]] |
| 628 | ** Entertainingly, the Repeater's instant kill effect used to have a chance to trigger whenever the equipped weapon damages a target. This includes damage caused by the Stock attachment – a weapon with both of them can One-''Miss'' Kill. However, it was sadly patched out in an update in early May of 2016, though mod interaction with certain mods can inadvertently bring back this behavior. |
| 629 | ** Skulljacking an enemy is guaranteed to kill them (provided you get the 70% chance to get the spikes in their brain in the first place). It only works on ADVENT enemies, but no matter how many hit points they have left, after the skulljack is complete the enemy dies. It's a useful way to kill a pesky enemy shieldbearer or officer and maybe get some intel bonuses in the bargain. |
| 630 | ** Due to the nature of the game, killing enemies in one hit is highly recommended at all times. Most weapons can instakill most targets on roughly the same level ((mini)bosses notwithstanding) if you utilize them cleverly, and a large part of the gameplay revolves around figuring out how to kill as many enemies with as few shots as possible. Ideally, once your round is over, there's nothing left standing that could shoot back. |
| 631 | * OptionalStealth: You can now use cover to sneak past enemies and set up ambushes. It is possible to even ghost Blacksite missions with a single Ranger who can plant the explosive and extract without alerting anyone. |
| 632 | * OurWeaponsWillBeBoxyInTheFuture: The boxiness of XCOM laser weaponry in the last game could have been a mere case of being designed for function in a limited span of time, but the magnetic weaponry wielded by ADVENT collaborators is designed to this aesthetic. The same applies for XCOM's magnetic weapons, though averted with the sleekly designed plasma weapons. |
| 633 | * OverlyLongTongue: Vipers can pull human-sized targets into melee range with their tongue. Thing is, they can do this to anyone/anything within their visual range, which means their tongue is somewhere around 20-30 meters long and therefore several times longer than themselves. |
| 634 | * PaddedSumoGameplay: The "Beta Strike" doubles the health of both sides but keeps damage ratings intact. It puts more emphasis on crowd control and disabling abilities than the base game, where dangerous enemies can be neutralized in the same turn they're engaged with the right tactics. |
| 635 | * PaletteSwap: The ''Alien Hunters'' and ''The Legacy Pack'' DLC introduce differently colored but otherwise identical versions of two regular alien species ([[spoiler:Neonate Vipers and Neonate Chryssalids]], respectively). Their only gameplay difference is that both are significantly weaker than their base game counterparts but make up for it by attacking in huge numbers. |
| 636 | * PeninsulaOfPowerLeveling: Any mission that has a Lost presence, and especially the ones with the "The Horde" sitrep, are prime material for leveling up your forces. Lost come in huge numbers and are easy to take down but mostly harmless themselves. |
| 637 | * PermanentlyMissableContent: |
| 638 | ** ''War of the Chosen'' adds "research breakthroughs", unique research projects that are only available for a short time that offer some special bonus, such as increasing the damage of all Assault Rifle type weapons by 1. |
| 639 | ** ''[=WotC=]'' also adds the eponymous Chosen, extremely powerful bosses that wield the game's foremost {{Infinity Plus One Sword}}s. These weapons can be looted from them after their defeat, but the option to kill them only arises once per campaign each. Failing to take them out forfeits any chance to acquire this equipment (and usually results in a TotalPartyKill, which tends to hurt even more). Few things in ''XCOM 2'' embody the game's "high risk, high reward" spirit better than assaults on Chosen strongholds. |
| 640 | * PerspectiveReversal: The previous game had you lead a globally supported XCOM against a mostly underground alien threat. This game has you fight against an alien-controlled Earth as an underground XCOM. This extends to gameplay: in the first game, you had to seek out hidden groups of enemies before you could attack them, but this time ''your'' forces typically start out in concealment, with your enemies in plain sight. |
| 641 | * PistolWhipping: How your soldiers subdue an ADVENT VIP to capture usually involves bashing them with their gun. Snipers especially dispense with subtlety, and just stock-strike the target with their rifles. |
| 642 | ** During a flashback, The Commander's last moments before entering stasis include bearing witness to XCOM Headquarters being ransacked by aliens before a Muton charges in and smacks the Commander in the face with his gun. |
| 643 | * ThePlayerIsTheMostImportantResource: Bradford and the rest of the XCOM resistance consider you as the Commander to be vital to their attempts to oust the Elders and their ADVENT regime from power. This becomes justified in the endgame. |
| 644 | * PlayingWithSyringes: [[spoiler:Dr. Vahlen survived the fall of XCOM and managed to establish her own underground lab. Unfortunately, without the Commander, Bradford, or Shen to keep her MadScientist tendencies in line, she wound up making [[DemonicSpiders the alien Rulers]]... which proceeded to escape.]] |
| 645 | * PlotTailoredToTheParty: |
| 646 | ** The ''Alien Hunter'' DLC mission has Bradford personally taking part in the mission, and he's a melee Ranger colonel. The mission also swarms you with newborn Vipers, with only 2-3 health each but with about a dozen in each firefight. As listed in the AwesomeButImpractical entry above, Bradford's Reaper skill is the perfect counter to these tons of low-health, plentiful enemies. |
| 647 | ** Similarly, the ''Shen's Last Gift'' DLC mission is the only occasion where [[TheEngineer Lily Shen]] takes to the field in person. Naturally, with her being essentially a colonel-ranked Specialist with tons of anti-mech abilities, the opposition consists entirely of robotic enemies. |
| 648 | * PluckyComicRelief: ''XCOM 2'' is a pretty grim game, but fortunately the Resistance Radio DJ is always good for a laugh. Just stop by the Avenger's bar every now and then for some humorous, extremely irreverent comments on the various shenanigans you've been up to lately. |
| 649 | * PointOfDivergence: In this timeline, the original iteration of X-COM was able to last against the initial invasion up until the Base Defense, and the defense's failure paved the way to Earth's surrender. |
| 650 | * PointOfNoReturn: Starting the Advent Network Tower mission locks you in to the endgame, preventing you from doing any more research or going on other missions. Fortunately, the game is kind enough to warn you and give a chance to walk away until you're actually ready. |
| 651 | * PoweredArmor: The tier 3 armors (basic and experimental) are this, with the project to unlock the basic tier 3 outright named as such, although tier 2 already start using crude exoskeletons. |
| 652 | * PowerUpLetdown: The Plasma Blade, the tier 3 sword for Rangers, does more damage than the Arc Blade, the tier 2 sword. However, the Plasma Blade's additional effect is to set an enemy on fire, which is helpful, but most enemies will continue attack while on fire (though they can't use special abilities ''most'' of the time), or can hunker down to put it out. The additional effect of the Arc Blade is a stun, with a 25% chance to activate and force the enemy to skip their next turn. While fire does cause damage over time, the sudden loss of the stun effect for a marginal increase in damage can be jarring. |
| 653 | * PracticalCurrency: Your FriendInTheBlackMarket pays you in miscellaneous supplies for what you sell him and accepts payment on his wares in access to various ADVENT encryption keys, patrol routes etc. (AKA Intel). |
| 654 | * PrisonLevel: With the "War of the Chosen" Content enabled, your soldiers can sometimes be kidnapped while on missions and taken to a prison camp to be interrogated for information on the Resistance. you must undertake a prison break mission to get them back into your squad and prevent them sharing any sensitive intel. |
| 655 | * ProceduralGeneration: Levels are generated from pre-designed pieces that are combined based on a set of mission variables. |
| 656 | * PropagandaMachine: ADVENT constantly spouts propaganda that portrays the alien "Elders" as peaceful and only desiring to help humanity, demonizes XCOM and other anti-alien/ADVENT resistance as "terrorists" and "troubled individuals", and completely whitewashes the events of 2015, insisting that the aliens came in peace, only to have the "corrupt governments of old" allegedly attack them unprovoked and cause countless deaths of innocent people. The propagandist who makes the speeches looks uncannily like a "perfected" Thin Man. |
| 657 | ** With the release of ''War of the Chosen'', XCOM can get in on the action as well; players can create their own posters in the Photobooth. Each mission autogenerates a poster upon completion, and other events such as a soldier being captured or being promoted to a high rank can also autogenerate new posters. These posters can then be seen pinned to walls in the ''Avenger'' and during missions. |
| 658 | ** The expansion also expands on the ADVENT propaganda by replacing Bradford's comments on the flight back with the ADVENT spin on what XCOM had just done, whether bemoaning their terrorist actions or justifying the existence of "re-education facilities" as an unfortunate necessity ''because'' of XCOM. [[BlatantLies Or assuring citizens that a temporary suspension of certain services is nothing to worry about and is in no way related to XCOM activity.]] |
| 659 | * PsychicPowers: As is standard for an XCOM game, you can train soldiers with these. They're powerful and somewhat easier to unlock in ''XCOM 2'', but this comes at the cost of requiring a dedicated class and special training slots; you can't train your existing veterans to have psionic potential. |
| 660 | * PurposelyOverpowered: [[spoiler:The Commander's Avatar]], which is only used in the final mission. No matter how strong or well-built your squad is, they're still far and away the single best member of your team. This is entirely justified, given that [[spoiler:Avatars are designed to be the strongest thing to exist, ever.]] |
| 661 | ** Chosen weapons. The Katana inflicts more damage than any other sword-based weapon, and ignores 5 points of armor on top of that[[note]]only a Sectopod and a Gatekeeper that's closed its shell have more than 5 armor[[/note]]. The Arashi has 4 modifications when the base maximum is 2[[note]](which you ''might'' be able to raise up to 3, depending on whether a region with this bonus exists on the map)[[/note]], and does one extra point of damage. The Disruptor Rifle also has 4 mods and can stun psionic enemies, one of the biggest counters to otherwise dangerous enemies. The Darklance does more damage than a Beam Sniper Rifle, has [[RuleOfThree 4 attachments]], and can be fired after moving, unlike a regular sniper rifle. The Darkclaw is also able to ignore armor like the Katana. The caveat is that they are unique (if you lose them, they are gone forever) and acquiring them requires defeating the Chosen in battle at their hideout, which is a long and involved process that may distract you from the Avatar Project. |
| 662 | ** When you choose to complete the ''Alien Hunter'' and the ''Shen's Last Gift'', you get Bradford and Lily Shen (respectively) added to you squad for the duration of the mission. Bradford is a Colonel-level Ranger with a unique Multipurpose Rifle that has more mods than you can put on your own guns (including the usually-exclusive-of-each-other Scope and Laser Sight) and does more damage than your currently level of tech, even if you're using Magnetic Weapons. Lily, on the other hand, is a Colonel-level Specialist, with abilities to specifically combat and counter robots (who are your ''only'' enemies on her mission), and her custom ROV-R Gremlin does more damage than a Level 2 Gremlin. While her gear is the same as the rest of your squad, her skills will absolutely shred everything you come across and are re-usable[[note]]A Specialist's ultimate offensive skill is normally once-a-mission, Shen has it with a cooldown instead.[[/note]] [[spoiler: and you'll need them]]. |
| 663 | * PyroManiac: ADVENT's Purifiers utilize a flamethrower and incendiary grenades. On the other hand, they don't care that most other ADVENT and Alien units are not fireproof, and will quite happily bathe Vipers in flame in order to set fire to the soldier that's been bound by the Viper. |
| 664 | * PyrrhicVictory: It's possible to complete a mission successfully while losing most or even all of your soldiers in the process. You'll reap the mission's reward, but the loss of so many troops will only spell hard times for you in the long term. |
| 665 | * RammingAlwaysWorks: Subverted. One of the random soldier backstories mentions them being arrested by Advent after they attempted to knock down one of their surveillance towers by ramming a car into it. |
| 666 | * RayGun: Unlike the coherent green blobs in the previous game and still used by the aliens, XCOM's "plasma" weapons now fire beams. |
| 667 | * RecruitingTheCriminal: The randomly generated backstories for recruits has a fairly typical one stating how [character] was rumored to have been a criminal in a prison in [country of origin], or that they actually were a former convict, but their skills coupled with XCOM's desperation mean that it's unwise to reject their help. |
| 668 | * RedShirt: Peter Osei and Ana Ramirez, a.k.a. Gatecrasher 1 and 2, from the tutorial. While they were engaging a superior and more numerous force, they make some questionable tactical moves that end up with them both dead. Hilariously, their game files actually list them as "[=DeadTutorialSoldier1=]" and "[=DeadTutorialSoldier2=]." |
| 669 | * RelationshipValues: The base game has a mechanism to track the relationships between each soldier, based on factors like how many battles they've fought together, who has healed who, shooting flanking enemies, and carrying unconscious or dying troops to safety. The only visible application of this is to determine which soldiers socialize with each other in the Avenger, although certain mods (like Squad Cohesion) use these values to assign bonuses or penalties based on the troops' relationships. |
| 670 | ** ''War of the Chosen'' finally utilized these values in an official capacity through the new Soldier Bonding system, that can unlock powerful perks for bonded soldiers. The exact nature of the relationship between soldiers through this system (BashBrothers, BattleCouple, FireForgedFriends, TeethClenchedTeamwork, TrueCompanions) is left up to the player. |
| 671 | * TheRemake: The game borrows a lot of elements from ''VideoGame/XComApocalypse'', such as a decades-long TimeSkip, battles in futuristic urban environments, XCOM no longer having funding from world governments, and so on. The ADVENT even use one of the alien faction symbols from ''Apocalypse''. |
| 672 | * RequiredSecondaryPowers: Even with the Advance Warfare Center, your soldiers cannot get perks they are not equipped for; a sharpshooter can't get gremlin-based abilities, and likewise specialists can't get pistol-based abilities. Everything else is fair game, however. |
| 673 | ** Similarly, some abilities are not as good without the backup from other synergised abilities: Run and Gun/Implacable can be dangerous without Shadowstep to protect you from overwatch fire. |
| 674 | ** ''War of the Chosen'' and its Training center removes one of the potential drawbacks: randomness. However, you now have to pay for the abilities your characters gain out of their native classes, and Psychic soldiers don't get any, period. |
| 675 | * LaResistance: XCOM is now a rebel force looking to overthrow the ADVENT Administration that rules the planet. |
| 676 | * TheRevolutionWillNotBeVilified: The XCOM-led resistance movement wants nothing more than to reclaim Earth from the aliens, to restore humanity's freedom, and to reveal the evils committed by the totalitarian ADVENT Administration to the masses. This is expressed by the motivations of XCOM's top staff, the Informant, and some of the randomly-generated biographies of XCOM soldiers. It is further reinforced in vanilla-gameplay by there being no penalties for committing excessive collateral damage in ADVENT cities (that could easily be spun as terrorist attacks), and no penalties for the deaths of civilians in most operations (excluding Retaliation missions, where you must rescue civilians that are working with the resistance). Granted, these game mechanics, especially the collateral damage penalties mechanic, [[RuleOfFun would make the tactical missions even more difficult and less fun to play]]. This is also a necessity stemming from civilian AI 'fight avoidance' routines: get away from the fighting, even if the hiding place it picks is dangerous. Hiding on top of fuel tankers is not unprecedented. |
| 677 | * RevolversAreJustBetter: |
| 678 | ** The Sharpshooter's basic handgun is a huge revolver. No reason is ever given why they don't use pistols like any RealLife military, so the devs probably had this trope in mind when they made the design decision, especially since Central talks about pistol marksmanship (not general handgun marksmanship) when he introduces the class. |
| 679 | *** Related to the above, the [[ColdSniper Hunter]]'s [[InfinityPlusOneSword Darkclaw pistol]], though rather subtle about it from the outside, explicitly notes in its item description that its inner workings seem to have been inspired by Earth's revolver technology. |
| 680 | ** Grenadiers field revolving grenade launchers very similar to RealLife examples like the South-African [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milkor_MGL Milkor MGL]] as their trademark secondary weapon. Using the beast usually triggers a lovingly detailed animation of the Grenadier working the ammo drum before firing. |
| 681 | * RidiculouslyPotentExplosive: Whatever 'X4-charges' are made of, one charge is enough to blow an entire ADVENT research lab to smithereens in a fireball worthy of Hollywood. |
| 682 | * RoaringRampageOfRevenge: Due to ''War of the Chosen'' upgrading the RelationshipValues to allow soldiers to bond, this can occur if a soldier's bondmate is killed in front of them. The soldier becomes affected by the 'berserk' status, making them uncontrollable and causing them to fire wildly on the aliens whether it's their turn or not, albeit with greatly-reduced accuracy. |
| 683 | * RobbingTheDead: You can now loot enemies for materials and equipment, similar to how you could scavenge equipment from EXALT troops in the previous game. |
| 684 | * {{Roboteching}}: What sets the Blaster Launcher apart from its basic cousin, the Rocket Launcher, is not the increased damage but the total independence from sight lines. The BL can be launched at anything within range no matter what's in the way, and the warhead will then manoeuvre over, around or through any obstacles until it hits the target. ''Very'' handy for getting rid of those pesky EMP spikes in the dreaded Avenger Defense missions - two soldiers with Blaster Launchers can usually destroy the spike in the player's first turn without ever engaging a single enemy. |
| 685 | * RockBeatsLaser: The bane of most of the exotic and dangerous aliens is a humble flashbang grenade. It disorients non-mechanical enemies, which locks out all abilities except for basic weapon attacks, slows their movement and reduces their aim. These can turn a squad of Vipers, Sectoids or Codices into pathetic rookies missing every shot they take at you, or destroy all of a Gatekeeper's psionic zombies in one go. |
| 686 | * RocketTagGameplay: Just like in the previous game, at the start, your conventional weapons can usually kill ADVENT Troopers in one hit, but theirs will also kill or gravely wound in one too. Also shifts away from this as later foes are tougher, but you also have better armour. |
| 687 | * RuleOfSymbolism: The Reveal Trailer shows a statue outside an ADVENT clinic depicting an evolved sectoid helping a human onto his feet, [[http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/06/03/xcom-2-reveal-trailer-rewind-theater?watch but as the devs implied]], it could also be interpreted as the sectoid leaving the human behind. |
| 688 | [[/folder]] |
| 689 | |
| 690 | [[folder:S - Z]] |
| 691 | * SadisticChoice: |
| 692 | ** Every month, you'll be faced with 2-3 Dark Events, but you can only ever counter one. Woe betide you if you have to choose between fewer supplies or a UFO chase. |
| 693 | ** Every victory in a ''Tactical Legacy Pack'' campaign gives you the choice between two mutually exclusive upgrade sets for your squad, with nail-biting decisions like "do I take the PCS upgrades for all my soldiers, or rather the selection of grenades?" being among the easier ones. |
| 694 | * SaveScumming: This is an XCOM game, where one errant move or the UsefulNotes/RandomNumberGenerator being particularly sadistic can cost you a mission or even the entire game, ''of course'' there would be save scumming. Unless you're playing with Ironman mode on, that is. |
| 695 | * SavedByCanon: Bradford, Lily, Kelly, Osei and Ramirez cannot be killed in Tactical Legacy Pack missions since they will appear in the main game. If these characters lose all their health during battle they will be unconscious instead. |
| 696 | * SayingSoundEffectsOutLoud: Unlike XCOM's regular weapons, the vintage guns from the ''Tactical Legacy Pack'' are heavily customized with improvised field repairs and graffiti, and some of the latter do this. The Prototype Plasma Rifle for instance has "Zap!" and "Brroar!" scribbled on its stock and barrel casing, respectively. |
| 697 | * ScaryDogmaticAliens: The Elders are ambiguously of the theocratic variety. On one hand, the Speaker refers to the Elders with a religious awe, ADVENT deploys psionic priests, and the Warlock outright refers to them as gods. On the other, it's never confirmed if the Ethereals consider themselves to be literal deities or if their worship is a codified religion the invaders brought with them. |
| 698 | * {{Scotireland}}: Randomly generated Irish troops tend to be voiced by Scottish voice actors, for some reason. |
| 699 | * ScratchDamage: In three flavors. |
| 700 | ** Every unit with a Dodge stat above 0 has a chance to downgrade a received hit to a graze instead that inflicts only a small percentage of its full damage. A godsend when your troops dodge incoming fire this way, but can rapidly spiral out of control if the lucky target was a [[SelfDuplication Codex]]. |
| 701 | ** Upgrading any weapon with a stock modification assures that a botched shot will still inflict 1-3 points of damage to the target, depending on the quality of the mod and some other factors. Also very dangerous when it triggers on a Codex, but quite helpful against [[spoiler:Avatars]] as it forces them to relocate even if the shot went wide, potentially offering another unit a better shot at it. |
| 702 | ** Last but not least and truest to the text, no matter how much armor a target has, any successful hit will always deal at least one point of damage even if the attack power is lower than the armor rating. |
| 703 | * SealedGoodInACan: The tutorial mission is about rescuing [[NonEntityGeneral The Commander]] from stasis, and your chief scientist is researching something they pulled out of your brain that ADVENT put in you. |
| 704 | * SeanConneryIsAboutToShootYou: |
| 705 | ** Several poses like this are available for propaganda posters in War of the Chosen. |
| 706 | ** Rifle-toting ADVENT troops, and Officers in particular, are fond of doing this when their pod is discovered. |
| 707 | ** With ''War of the Chosen'' installed, Pratal Mox has a habit of shooting the camera in his cutscenes during "Lost And Abandoned". |
| 708 | * ScrewThisImOuttaHere: At any point during the mission (provided it's not an [[ExactWords escort the VIP to EVAC mission]]), you can call in an Evac zone and bring your soldiers back, regardless if the mission was successful or not. If you don't have any methods of healing, [[HeroOnHiatus you can bring your wounded soldiers back to the Avenger and finish the mission]]. Very helpful if you've accomplished the mission objective. |
| 709 | * SequelHook: [[spoiler:Before being hinted about by an underwater base, after the final cinematic showing Resistance and XCOM forces retaking Earth from leftover ADVENT forces, another brief scene shows the wreckage of the Avatar base, and an eerie purple glow rising from a fissure in the ocean floor. Whatever the Ethereals hinted at that destroyed worlds, it looks like it's on its way...]] |
| 710 | * SequenceBreaking: Dragging out the campaign for long enough can create a few instances. |
| 711 | ** Gatekeepers are supposed to be encountered for the first time on the Codex Brain Coordinates mission where one appears in a manner that explains its rather unusual name. If you don't tackle this mission until June or later when the most advanced ADVENT troops have been deployed, you'll eventually encounter Gatekeepers as part of regular pods with no idea as to why the hell they're named like this. Their appearance certainly doesn't explain anything about it. |
| 712 | ** The Blacksite mission is what clues XCOM in on the Elders' actual plan for humanity, canonically followed by one XCOM strike team [[spoiler:accidentally summoning and killing an Avatar, and thus the Elder that's controlling it]]. This in turn triggers the endgame both for the player and InUniverse, prompting the Spokesman to [[spoiler:launch an emergency broadcast to warn XCOM that humanity's time is running out fast]]. Thing is, these missions don't need to be done in this specific order, and if you ignore the Blacksite mission long enough, the Spokesman will eventually chime in aboard the Avenger with a random message that spoils the entire [[TheReveal reveal]] inherent in the WhamLine he's supposed to deliver under completely different circumstances. |
| 713 | * SerialKiller: Some of the recruits for XCOM have biographies that imply that they were this at some point; They're rumored to be ex-convicts and have a gruesome habit of collecting "trophies" from the bodies of the aliens they kill. |
| 714 | * {{Sideboob}}: The Spider Suit lacks an undershirt and if a woman is wearing it, her breasts are noticeable from the sides. |
| 715 | * ShellShockedVeteran: |
| 716 | ** The randomly-generated biographies for recruits frequently demonstrate this status, either as former XCOM personnel, soldiers who went renegade and hunted aliens after seeing their countries surrender, or the quiet types who Bradford advises to let be. |
| 717 | ** Soldiers who are heavily injured in a mission have a chance to become shaken. Shaken soldiers take a penalty to their [[HeroicWillpower will]] which has a chance to be removed and _increased_ if they participate in a successful mission. |
| 718 | * ShoutOut: |
| 719 | ** While ''The Avenger'' is named for the craft in the original ''XCOM'', it shares a number of traits with [[Film/TheAvengers2012 another well-known]] [[AirborneAircraftCarrier Airborne-Aircraft-Carrier]][[MilitaryMashupMachine -mobile-base hybrid]]. As if to drive the point home, one of the Tactical Legacy Pack campaigns is flat out called [[AvengersAssemble Avenger Assemble]]. |
| 720 | ** The VichyEarth scenario, the armored mooks, the simple ADVENT logo, even some of the dark secrets the aliens are hiding have great similarity to ''Series/{{V|2009}}''. |
| 721 | ** One of the intel caches you can find is named 'Ominous Glow' - it concerns a [[VideoGame/CommandAndConquerTiberianSeries crystalline substance overtaking the local flora]]. |
| 722 | ** With the Resistance Warrior DLC, you'll gain two additional rookies with the classic ''[[VideoGame/XComUFODefense UFO Defense]]'' "blowout" hairstyle and tattered versions of the ''[[VideoGame/XCOMEnemyUnknown Enemy Unknown]]'' Kevlar armor. Their biographies allude to an event known as the "Kiryu-Kai Disaster," a reference to [[http://lparchive.org/X-COM-UFO-Defense/ GuavaMoment's famed novelization/Let's Play of the original game]]. |
| 723 | ** [[BlueScreenOfDeath Project Bluescreen]], about finding more effective munitions against the enemy's robotic units, is an odd combination of ShoutOut and TakeThat. |
| 724 | ** The ultimate armor that can be crafted by XCOM is called the "[=W.A.R.suit=]" and is a powered armor that projects energy shields. The Warsuit is the name of ComicBook/LexLuthor's powered armor, which also projects energy shields. |
| 725 | ** Much like the first game, many of the game's achievements qualify: |
| 726 | *** "Come Back To Me": Killing a Sectoid mind controlling an ally. Like the villain from the 2014 film of the same name, the Sectoid alters minds, raise the dead, and both effects end if the Sectoid dies. |
| 727 | *** [[Music/DaftPunk Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger]] |
| 728 | *** {{Excalibur}} |
| 729 | *** [[Franchise/MassEffect Shadow Broker]]: Sell 1000 supplies worth of goods on the black market. |
| 730 | *** Literature/TheMostDangerousGame: Win a Multiplayer Match. |
| 731 | *** Series/TheUntouchables: Win a mission without losing an agent on Commander+. |
| 732 | *** [[SemperFi The Few and the Proud]]: Beat the game on Commander+ difficulty without buying a Squad Size upgrade. |
| 733 | ** Firebrand (Skyranger pilot) will randomly inform you: [[Film/{{Aliens}} "We're in the pipe, five by five"]]. |
| 734 | ** When completing a hack successfully, soldiers may exclaim "[[Film/{{Hackers}} Hack The Planet!]]". |
| 735 | ** When a [[ColdSniper Sharpshooter]] uses [[TheGunslinger certain pistol abilities]], they may say "[[Film/{{Tombstone}} I'm your Huckleberry!]]" |
| 736 | ** One of the possible nicknames for soldiers is [[Music/MotleyCrue Dr. Feelgood]]. |
| 737 | ** The Skulljack looks very similar to the Omni-Tool blades in ''VideoGame/MassEffect3''. |
| 738 | ** The Muton armor must have been taken from some dead Krogan (in addition to being closer to ''UFO Defense'''s skintight green suit). |
| 739 | ** One of the new facial scars added is a GlasgowGrin named the [[Film/TheDarkKnight Serious Smile]]. |
| 740 | ** Grenadiers will sometimes yell [[Film/TotalRecall1990 "Get ready for a surprise!"]] when launching grenades. |
| 741 | ** Bradford has a few to give in the ''Alien Hunters'' DLC: |
| 742 | *** One of his lines when he kills an alien is [[Film/{{Unforgiven}} "I've killed just about everything that walks or crawls"]]. |
| 743 | *** In Operation Regal Beast, he will comment [[Film/RaidersOfTheLostArk "Vipers. Why did it have to be Vipers?"]]. |
| 744 | *** During the first Tactical Legacy Pack mission he mentions "silly rumors about [[Literature/{{Animorphs}} shape-shifting animals]] and [[Franchise/{{Transformers}} vehicles]]". |
| 745 | ** The flak jacket customization option for first tier SPARK armor makes them look uncannily similar to [[Manga/AppleSeed Briarios Hecatonchires]] (or possibly the Ingrams in ''Anime/Patlabor2TheMovie''). |
| 746 | ** In "War of the Chosen": |
| 747 | *** One of the random texts on a poster commemorating a [[RelationshipValues bond]] between two of your soldiers is [[Film/TheyLive "They're all out of]] [[ChewBubblegum bubblegum"]]. |
| 748 | ** One of the abilities granted by a third level [[RelationshipValues battle bond]] between your operatives is ''[[CombinationAttack Dual Strike]]''. Someone's been playing quite a bit of ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening''... |
| 749 | ** A number of Julian's lines in combat when he is installed in the SPARK body: |
| 750 | *** [[Film/Ghostbusters1984 "There is no Julian. There is only Shen."]] |
| 751 | *** [[Film/BladeRunner "I want more life!"]] |
| 752 | *** [[{{Film/Hackers}} "I've hacked the Gibson!"]] |
| 753 | ** The [=SPARK=] are accompanied by a floating polyhedron-shaped drone named BIT, similar to the bits in ''{{Film/Tron}}''. |
| 754 | ** The Firebrand dropship's front section looks quite a lot like the {{Rage Helm}}s worn by ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000'''s {{Space Marine}}s. |
| 755 | *** One of the posters' randomly generated text actually has "Purge the Xenos!" |
| 756 | ** One of the helmets added by the Tactical Legacy Pack looks a lot like [[VideoGame/{{Starcraft}} Jim Raynor's]]. |
| 757 | ** The Avatars manifest a translucent image of an Elder that [[Manga/JojosBizarreAdventure stands]] behind them whenever they use a psychic ability. |
| 758 | * ShortRangeShotgun: The Ranger's shotgun grows vastly more effective at nearly point-blank range, with considerable buffs to accuracy and critical hit chance when the target is standing on an adjacent tile. Conversely, shooting at targets more than ~8 tiles away results in a rapid decrease in accuracy and crit chance, to the point that you need colonel-level aim stats to even have a chance at reliably hitting something at medium range. |
| 759 | * ShrineToTheFallen: The bar aboard ''The Avenger'' has a memorial wall covered with photos of the soldiers that are killed during the game. |
| 760 | * TheSiege: The two types of Avenger Defence missions play out like this. Both are easily among the most difficult mission in the whole game, yet at the same time they're absolutely awesome in their scale. |
| 761 | ** If a Dark Event sets a UFO on your trail, it can catch up to the Avenger and force an emergency landing with an {{EMP}} weapon that keeps the ship grounded. It's up to you to disable the EMP spike while keeping a small army of ADVENT forces from entering the Avenger, with enemy reinforcements arriving every turn. To spice things up even more, you're running a tight turn limit (as usual) because ADVENT has a whole fleet of battleships inbound on your location. |
| 762 | ** Even better than the above is what happens when you allow any Chosen to gain enough knowledge to track down the Avenger. They bring so many forces with them (including four [[CoolTank unique ADVENT tanks]] you won't see in action anywhere else) that you can actually deploy ''two squads'' of five soldiers each to repel the onslaught, backed up by up to four heavy turrets if you installed a Defence Matrix aboard the Avenger. The main target, however, is the [[{{BFG}} gigantic siege cannon]] on the other end of the map that's about to gut the Avenger like a fish. It's so huge that you can't destroy it by conventional means. You need to blow up its generator, a railway-mounted monstrosity that creates the game's largest, most powerful explosion when destroyed. |
| 763 | * SightedGunsAreLowTech: Zig-Zagged. Plasma weapons have no sights of their own, but you're free to attach GunAccessories like a scope and a LaserSight to them. |
| 764 | * SigilSpam: |
| 765 | ** The XCOM logo, though surprisingly not by XCOM themselves. They only have it when appropriate, such as inside the base, on the unmistakable hull of their ship, and sometimes on their operatives. Funnily, their X4 demo charges are also XCOM-logo-shaped. Meanwhile, it's the Resistance havens that often have quite a few XCOM flags, graffiti logos and posters, sometimes out in the open where anybody with a telescope can see them. Since the only time you physically visit those locations are when ADVENT discovers and raids them, one has to wonder if those open symbols of allegiance had something to do with it. |
| 766 | ** The ADVENT logo is virtually everywhere. ADVENT troops have it on their uniforms, their [=MEC=]s, their vehicles and on their public facilities. In the city centers and slums, it can also be seen on holographic displays, TV screens and in all ADVENT propaganda broadcasts. Even the publicly inaccessible top floors of ADVENT Network Tower have ADVENT logo sculptures for interior decoration. This trope is of course the signature look of totalitarian dystopian police states in general. |
| 767 | * SimpleYetAwesome: |
| 768 | ** The humble [[BlindedByTheLight flashbang grenade]]. It costs only 35 supplies (dirt cheap for its abilities). It is an absolute bane to any ADVENT enemies. In particular, it applies -20 to Aim, -30 to Will, kills any Psi Zombies, and cancels Overwatch, Suppression, and Mind Control (except for [[spoiler:Avatars]]). In short, it will make the lives of XCOM soldiers far, far easier. |
| 769 | *** It's quite funny to watch enemies who would be fearsome like [[DumbMuscle Mutons]], [[ProjectedMan Codices]], [[WeHaveReserves Troopers]], [[ExposedExtraterrestrials Sectoids]], and [[ShockAndAwe Lancers]] turn into [[ImperialStormtrooperMarksmanshipAcademy pathetic rookies missing every shot at you]]. |
| 770 | ** Salvo from the Grenadier is similar to the Heavy's Bullet Swarm from the previous game. It allows the user to use a grenade or heavy weapon as their first move without ending the turn. Sounds simple, but greatly increases flexibility, and it's also powerful on other classes that get it through the Advanced Warfare Center. For example, it allows a Gunslinger-spec Sharpshooter to soften up a pod so the following Faceoff can kill them all, or de-armour an Andromedon or Sectopod so Fan Fire hurts much more. |
| 771 | ** All the moves that allow multiple attacks with a single action - Chain Shot, Fan Fire and Rapid Fire - are invaluable against aliens with reaction abilities, like Alien Rulers, [[spoiler:Avatars]] or Codices, and the 15% aim penalty can be entirely eradicated with a Superior Scope. |
| 772 | ** Frag and Plasma grenades are free, come in infinite quantities, and can shred armor, destroy cover, and subtract health from enemies. No need to set the environment on fire, or spread gas all over the place, or douse corrosive acid on the floor, or even fry enemy robots. Pure explosive force is all that's needed. |
| 773 | * SmashToBlack: Happens twice in quite rapid succession. The first example from the tutorial mission shows Central's boot coming down on a mortally wounded ADVENT soldier's head from that soldier's perspective, briefly interrupting Shen's radio message in the process. The second is part of a flashback when Central relays to the Commander how XCOM got curbstomped by the aliens during the initial invasion twenty years back; it involves the defenseless Commander taking a Muton's rifle butt to the face in first person, with predictable results. |
| 774 | * SmugSnake: Quite literally in the "Retaliation" trailer, as a reptilian Thin Man smirks at the camera. |
| 775 | * SpitefulAI: |
| 776 | ** In Retaliation missions, ADVENT troops will try to focus mostly on civilians, even if they know the player's squad is around. This unfortunately makes it much more likely they will kill all the civilians, causing the mission to end in failure even if all squad members survive and kill all the aliens. Justified though; it's called [[RevengeBeforeReason Retaliation,]] come on. |
| 777 | ** In protect the data tap missions, it is possible for aliens that have had their aim lowered to go after the much easier-to-hit data tap rather than your troops. |
| 778 | * SoMuchForStealth: Certain actions will always break Concealment even if your soldier isn't spotted carrying them out, like planting X4 charges in an Alien Facility or hacking into secure consoles. |
| 779 | * SortingAlgorithmOfEvil: |
| 780 | ** With every month your guerilla campaign drags on, ADVENT breaks out more advanced unit types in their efforts to stop XCOM until eventually their most dangerous troops are being deployed by June/July. Some enemies disappear almost entirely to be replaced by all-around better alternatives, like Sectoids making way for ADVENT Priests, or Mutons diminishing in numbers while more Andromedons show up. It's especially noticeable with the bog-standard ADVENT soldiers, the very first enemies you encounter. They come in three explicit tiers (Basic, Advanced, Elite), each with more health, sometimes armor, better aim, better equipment and new/upgraded abilities over their lesser brethren. |
| 781 | ** Also worth noting from a lore perspective is that any alien unit outranks ADVENT soldiers, Officers included. If a pod consists of ADVENT and aliens, the leader is always one of the aliens, even if it's just a lowly Sectoid. Most tellingly, even ADVENT's ''MechaMooks'' have more authority, and arguably more autonomy, than their organic goons. |
| 782 | ** Averted in the backstory, where instead of playing it straight like the original game, the Ethereals just decide to throw everything at humanity immediately, which means XCOM, not even getting their laser weapons yet, easily gets stomped by advanced enemy units like the Sectopods. |
| 783 | * SpectacularSpinning: Aside from the Grenadier's [[GatlingGood cannons]], almost all plasma weapons incorporate some spinning parts, most notably the glowing blue acceleration chamber that emits the actual plasma beam. Unsurprisingly, the aliens' plasma guns do the same thing, only even more obviously. |
| 784 | * SpentShellsShower: All ballistic weapons [[ShownTheirWork except the Sharpshooter's revolver]] eject a realistic number of spent casing when they're fired, so automatic weapons create textbook examples of this trope. Looks particularly impressive on the Grenadier's [[GatlingGood minigun]] due to its large caliber. |
| 785 | * StarfishLanguage: How ADVENT troops bark orders at each other. The Skirmishers also use it here and there, so it's at least possible to gather the context if not the actual meaning. Strangely, civilians that pass through ADVENT checkpoints are adressed in the very same language and seem to understand it just fine, which makes you wonder why the Resistance hasn't been able to translate any Elder at all in twenty years. |
| 786 | * SticksToTheBack: |
| 787 | ** Rangers, Grenadiers and Psi Ops carry their secondary weapons on their back without obvious means of fixation. The only exception is the Ranger's basic sword by virtue of having an actual scabbard (though the scabbard itself is an example). |
| 788 | ** Absolutely everyone holsters their primary weapon on their right hip when they need both hands for LeParkour, often accompanied by a satisfying *click* sound in cutscenes that might hint at maglocks being involved. This includes the Sharpshooter's sniper rifle, a gun so long half of it clips through the ground every time this happens. To top it off, Sharpshooters already carry their handguns in the same spot, so they actually stack two guns on one invisible mount. |
| 789 | * {{Stripperiffic}}: The ''Anarchy's Children'' DLC gives your operatives some rather unconventional armor options. The most modest option sends them into battle with a midriff-baring breastplate or an open jacket, but particularly mischievous players can send their troops into battle [[http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/296482365526679941/ECA61B7447A86836182BB3C1CD325DE37A50666B/ basically in their underwear]]. |
| 790 | * StuffBlowingUp: |
| 791 | ** The sequel gives the destruction system a huge upgrade, with prettier explosions and the ability to demolish roofs and floors to open new entry points. The Grenadier in particular shines in this area. |
| 792 | ** Anything that a Faceless hits with an AOE attack will be destroyed instantly. This is particularly bad when it comes to [[ShootTheFuelTank propane tanks]] and [[EveryCarIsAPinto cars]] (which [[OneHitKill can deal upwards of 10 damage]]). Even if the attack itself misses, it's not a good idea to be standing around cars or environmental explosives. |
| 793 | ** A particularly notable change is that, for buildings with multiple stories, you can destroy the actual floors, causing anyone standing on them to fall down to the first floor and take extra falling damage. Of course, enemies can also do this to you if you're not careful... |
| 794 | ** Blowing the floor out from under turrets is also an easy OneHitKill, for obvious reasons. This is fairly handy, since late-game turrets are actually reasonably chunky and well-armoured, making them difficult to disable with normal weapons. |
| 795 | ** Between late-game plasma weapons, heavy weapons, and grenades, the X4 charges in the Destroy Alien Facility missions can almost seem redundant. You still need to plant them to actually complete the mission, but you can almost level the entire facility just with the weapons you're carrying to fight the aliens. |
| 796 | ** In ''War of the Chosen'' the Reapers can excel at this. In addition to their Claymore mines, they can also gain the Remote Start ability that instantly detonates any explosive environmental object with twice its normal blast radius and damage. Gets particularly entertaining when used on those large fuel tanks ADVENT trains sometimes pull around; the resulting explosion is the largest and most powerful in the game, with a fireball that can easily cover the whole screen. |
| 797 | * StupidityInducingAttack: Mimic Beacons. They create a holographic copy of the soldier who threw it, and once it's up, every active enemy on the map will ignore all else. Some will run across the map just to get a good look at it, and others will dive out of cover entirely just to try to flank it -- even if they were already flanking another soldier, and even if doing so would leave them unable to attack it that turn! Incredibly powerful, but they require rare Faceless Corpses to build. |
| 798 | ** The Mimic Beacon was nerfed by an early patch, as players could abuse it by giving the beacon cover and using defense protocol to make it nigh-impossible for the enemy to hit the decoy, causing the AI to waste entire turns attacking it while ignoring everything else. The patch has made it so the enemies attacking the beacon always hit it. |
| 799 | * StylisticSuck: Jake Solomon has described the slogans available on XCOM propaganda posters as being like the tagline of an 80's hero movie. |
| 800 | * SuperpowerLottery: The Advanced Warfare Center allows operatives to learn additional skills outside of their main specialisations as they gain experience and ranks. These skills can come from the other classes, or they might be unique skills that aren't part of the main skill trees. If you're lucky, it could be something very useful like Shredder; if you're not, it could be something redundant, like getting the Ranger's Rapid Fire on a Grenadier with the nearly identical Chain Shot. |
| 801 | ** War of the Chosen mitigates some of the Lottery factor, at least; the new Training Center allows soldiers to gain up to four additional perks from other classes. Whilst this still won't stop you from getting some really useless options, your soldiers are no longer ''locked out'' of gaining their single secret ability if you don't rush the Warfare Center. |
| 802 | * SuperWindowJump: XCOM soldiers love jumping through windows. |
| 803 | * TacticalDoorUse: Doors hamper enemy line of sight, but opening a door doesn't break a soldier's Concealment so long as they're hugging the wall beside it, so it's possible to open a door with a scout, confirm an enemy presence beyond, close the portal, and put the rest of the squad on Overwatch in hopes that the enemy patrol moves your way on their turn. ''War of the Chosen'' takes this up a notch with its Chosen base assault maps and Reapers that are stealthy enough to sneak into a room, close the door behind them, and lurk in the corner while the rest of your squad stacks up on the door to form a firing squad. |
| 804 | * TacticalRockPaperScissors: Explicitly designed into XCOM's classes, each one counters and is countered by various Aliens. |
| 805 | ** Rangers deal bonus damage to Sectoids, and their ''Bladestorm'' lets them pre-emptively negate the constriction ability of a Viper, deal devastating damage to Stun Lancers and Chrysallid packs in close quarters and, once equipped with the Fusion blade, potentially setting them ablaze, negating their melee attacks in turn. They can also reload, move, and then attack a Codex in one turn, likely flanking it and hitting it for a quick kill before it can clone itself. On the other hand, their reliance on flanking, getting one-shot kills, and melee combat are less effective against the sheer bulk of Gatekeepers and Sectopods, who also explode when killed, making closing to zero range... ''less than advisable'', while Mutons can reliably counter their sword strikes and instead land a melee hit of their own. It also makes them more prone to trigger another enemy squad. |
| 806 | ** Grenadiers and their ability to shred armor make them extremely efficient at bringing down heavily armored foes, such as Andromedons, Sectopods, and Gatekeepers, being able to shred even the most heavily armored enemies on the highest difficulties down not only to zero armor, but [[DamageIncreasingDebuff with Rupture, give them an effective -3 armor]] and negating their vaunted resilience. Their increased blast radius on grenades and ability to reliably pile on the Burning status, or smash cover and shred armor in one go, also makes them good answers to Chryssalid swarms and teams of Mutons. However, their poor aim renders them vulnerable to Archons with their inherent defense and dodge, Vipers, who have similarly high dodge and can worsen the Grenadier's poor aim with poison, and Codices, which not only are likely to dodge their inaccurate fire, but also multiply as a result of the grazed hit. They're also likely to get behind on ExperiencePoints because explosives are used more to make enemies vulnerable than to finish them off. |
| 807 | ** Snipers, with their precision burst damage, are good counters to Archons, whose tendency to fly up and about make them more vulnerable to long-ranged squadsight fire than other Aliens; they can set off Berserkers on an UnstoppableRage while they're still far from any allied forces, causing it to vent said rage blindly on nearby aliens; or reach out and eliminate crucial enemy backline units like Shieldbearers that other classes can't reach without dangerously overextending. They are countered by Codices teleporting or cloning in on them, as well as getting jumped by Stun Lancers or Chryssalids when you thought they were safe. |
| 808 | ** Specialists, being {{Support Party Member}}s typically don't engage in combat enough, but their hacking skills make them good against mechanical enemies. They're relatively poor against heavier organic forces, especially those that don't trigger overwatch shots as often due to greater focus on shooting rather than moving. |
| 809 | * TakeCover: The most important defensive mechanic in XCOM 2, with survival depending largely on whether units are behind cover or not. Cover does not block damage, but instead increases Defense and, as such, reduces the chance that a shot will hit. Several abilities rely on the unit being in cover to activate. When the squad is still concealed, cover also serves as a hiding spot -- ADVENT units will not notice an XCOM operative in cover unless they happen to flank said operative. |
| 810 | * TakeYourTime: Zig-zagged. |
| 811 | ** Generally averted. Nearly every mission that appears on the map is time sensitive; you'll miss them if you don't do them when they appear. The Avatar Project also makes sure you don't dawdle on the Geoscape game, as the only way keep the timer from reaching its end is to destroy the Project's facilities and complete story missions. |
| 812 | ** However, it's played straight when it comes to the final mission. [[spoiler:The Informant warns you that the Elders are about to enact a plan that will result in the extinction of the human race, which will be triggered by a public announcement from the ADVENT Speaker.]] Despite the urgency, you're free to continue to do your thing under the usual restrictions; however long you take, the day you choose to do the endgame mission will retroactively always have been the day that [[spoiler:the Speaker's announcement]] was scheduled. |
| 813 | * TatteredFlag: As a gesture of respect and as a beacon of hope, a severely-tattered original XCOM flag adorns the armory wall. |
| 814 | * TechnicolorMagic: The color purple is associated with the powerful Psionic abilities, which all give off a similar violet hue when activated and even gives your Psi soldiers purple eyes. As in the last game, the Elders' psionic aura is also purple as well. [[spoiler: The only exception is the Commander, whose psionic aura is light blue.]] Lampshaded by the Chosen Hunter: |
| 815 | --> "If it's purple, it ''must'' be psionic." |
| 816 | * ThereAreNoCoincidences: Shortly after the Commander returns and begins taking the fight to the Aliens, the Spokesman contacts the crew of the Avenger to let them know the aliens are frantically rushing to complete a top secret operation known only as "The Avatar Project," and draws the conclusion that the aliens have decided to stamp out the Resistance once and for all. [[spoiler: It turns out to be an aversion; the Aliens' work on the Avatar Project is completely unrelated to the Resistance. They'd been working on it since the very beginning, and only sped up recently when the Ethereals' rapidly-deteriorating bodies took a turn for the worse.]] |
| 817 | * TheresNoKillLikeOverkill: Most weapons shoot multiple rounds per attack, and if the burst kills the target, the first bullet is already fatal. That doesn't stop the shooter from holding down the trigger anyway. Grenadiers in particular pump at least a dozen extra rounds into the fallen corpse every time they kill something. |
| 818 | * ThereWasADoor: |
| 819 | ** Invoked by a good number of weapons, notably the Shredder and Shredstorm Cannons. Due to the procedural map generation, it's entirely possible the doors into a place you need to get into are inconveniently placed (especially on timed missions.) So go ahead and make your own. |
| 820 | ** Also common with several alien units. Gatekeepers and Sectopods would be too big for doors in any case so they just make their own. Andromedons ''could'' fit through most doors but they still prefer the direct route. Taking control of any of these units is a great way to make the trope work in XCOM's favor. |
| 821 | ** The layout of the small base leading up to each Chosen's stronghold practically ''encourages'' this. You can breach through walls to quickly get to the [[spoiler:Ascension Gate]] and potentially avoid encounters with enemy pods, or you can fight your way through the hard way. |
| 822 | ** Sometimes your operatives invert this in an amusing fashion by actually using a door that is literally the last part of the room that's still standing after you blew the place to hell and back. XCOM pathing can be funny. |
| 823 | * TimedMission: Most missions are time-based in XCOM 2. Defusing bombs, extracting a VIP before your escape is cut off, destroying a data relay or downloading something before it gets erased, and so on. Appropriately, Bradford is a lot more insistent on you getting off your ass and finishing the timed mission objective and will start to panic if you're down to one turn left. Even missions without an explicit timer usually put you under time pressure; retaliation missions often have a civilian dying each turn to unseen aliens, and "protect the data relay" missions have the data relay already being fired upon before you get there. Lastly, the campaign as a whole is on a timer. You ''must'' defeat the Aliens before they finish the Avatar Project, or else it's GameOver, though you can buy yourself a lot of time by sabotaging blacksites and completing story objectives. |
| 824 | * TimeSkip: The game takes place 20 years after ''XCOM: Enemy Unknown'', starting in 2035. |
| 825 | * TooAwesomeToUse: |
| 826 | ** Any of your best operatives. All of them get better with use... except at the maximum rank, and they all need to sleep for days straight after a mission or they (literally) go crazy and hide in a corner on the next mission. So you don't get to use your best soldiers often, and when you do it slows down the rate you get better soldiers since they just destroy any XP they would normally get. |
| 827 | ** Overdrive Serum. It improves a soldier's mobility, makes them immune from insanity effects, and reduces damage taken for the next two turns. The catch? It's a single-use item that is lost permanently upon consumption. Add to the fact that Berserkers are excessively rare and they're typically only deployed to the field for about a month or two, and you have a small number of items of extremely limited utility. |
| 828 | ** Breaking Concealment as a Ranger with Phantom can be this. Phantom allows a Ranger to remain in Concealment even after the rest of the team is revealed, which allows them to continue to scout ahead for other foes. If you break Concealment, Conceal gives that Ranger one and only one more chance to go back into Concealment. Therefore, for Commanders it can be a struggle to decide whether you want to break Concealment to help against this pod of foes and maybe one more, or just remain in Concealment the whole mission. |
| 829 | * TookALevelInBadass : The few aliens XCOM already faced on the battlefield in Enemy Unknown that are back in this game are all a bit different, and for the better: |
| 830 | ** The Sectoid, once the most basic enemy unit with tiny health, weak attacks and a boosting psionic ability that risked killing the host, and not even scary in the slightest, is back taller and more frightening than ever, with much more health and psionic powers not to be taken lightly since it can raise its dead allies as zombies and even attempt to mind control your troops (this power was in the hands of end-game enemies in the previous game)! |
| 831 | ** The Thin Man shows its true colors as the Viper, giving up its humanoid form for a fully serpentine build, and this time it is dangerous as hell if you make the mistake of splitting your squad : it only needs one turn to tongue-snatch a soldier to itself before grappling and constricting him/her. And it kept its poisonous attacks and gun. |
| 832 | ** The Muton didn't change much in appearance, but got a new powerful melee attack and can now counter Rangers' melee attacks frequently. All its former weapons and grenades remain. |
| 833 | ** The Berserker is now so muscular that it no longer has skin, and the new mechanic that allows two moves before a melee attack makes it a very real threat to take care of before its strong attacks wreck your squad. |
| 834 | ** The Sectopod used to have one big weakness: its immobility combined with a moderate attack range that allowed you to ignore it while you wrecked its allies. The new version is a literal siege tower with legs that can pick up troops on high grounds very easily with a powerful machine gun and lay waste to the battlefield with massive charged blasts that will force you to reposition or die. |
| 835 | ** With the ''War of the Chosen'', the retaliation site missions. Now the settlements actually have soldiers who fight back, like a proper resistance. |
| 836 | * TorchesAndPitchforks: The sci-fi version and mostly unarmed, but the spirit is definitely there when [[spoiler:XCOM reveal ADVENT's atrocities to the whole of humanity during a planetwide broadcast of the Speaker and the audience immediately charges the stage when they realize what they're seeing. It's rather astounding how quickly ''everyone'' turns on the aliens after having been fed ADVENT's highly effective propaganda for twenty years, though, just because of one pirate broadcast launched by what they were told is a ruthless terrorist organization.]] |
| 837 | * TrademarkFavoriteFood: ADVENT may be an evil organization who won't rest until all of humanity is subjugated, but everyone really loves those tasty burgers of theirs. Dr. Tygan muses about that's the one thing he misses about working for them, and it annoys Bradford to no end how his staff manage to smuggle them aboard and leave the wrappers everywhere. Nobody knows what they're made of, but they're so damn good they don't care. |
| 838 | * TrailersAlwaysLie: The trailer shown at Gamestop for the console releases made it look like a fast-paced action game, primarily by making terrible decisions (the entire squad using suppression or being suppressed, sprinting from the squad to behind enemy lines to make the camera follow the soldier) instead of showing it as a strategy game. |
| 839 | * TrainingFromHell: ImpliedTrope and DeconstructedTrope in the extension. One covert ops you can send soldiers on while the rest of XCOM is doing their thing is go to train with [[DefectorFromDecadence the Skirmishers]]. While the mission is always a success, sending a lone soldier has a moderate chance of bringing them back injured enough to need hospitalization for a few days (sending a scientist with the soldier negates this risk though). It is a {{Reconstruction}} as well since while training is harsh enough your soldiers can get injured, the Skirmishers know when to stop and never kill your soldiers in a training accident, and the soldier sent for training gains a permanent increase to their skill point gain chance. |
| 840 | * TrickBomb: |
| 841 | ** Grenades are limited to one per soldier (except grenadiers, who get two, possibly three with an upgrade) even if you get extra inventory slots. That's probably because they're meant to be strategic game-changers, like the Flashbang, which disables most enemies without killing them, or acid bombs that make whole areas impassable. |
| 842 | ** The Blaster Launcher is back, letting a soldier equipped with it deliver explosive ordinance anywhere on the map. Around corners, over buildings, through doorways and windows. . . doesn't matter. If you know where the enemies are, the Blaster Launcher can get there. |
| 843 | * TriumphantReprise: |
| 844 | ** The theme that plays as your squad departs for a mission, is given a reprise when the mission is successful. If you take casualties during the mission, the theme is [[DarkReprise much more somber]]. |
| 845 | ** The already heroic main theme gets a particularly epic expansion during the final cutscene [[spoiler:as you watch a group of resistance fighters fly the XCOM banner over a recently conquered ADVENT checkpoint]]. |
| 846 | * TronLines: Not to an excessive degree, but Tier-3 armors have glowing blue lines and circles running along the suit. The aliens engage in this a little with [[spoiler: the Elders' human hosts, the Avatars, which have bright [[TechnicolorMagic purple lines]] in contrast to your own soldiers' blue.]] In ''War of the Chosen'', ADVENT Spectres have green ones, and their overall aesthetic makes them look like they just stepped off the set of ''Film/TronLegacy''. |
| 847 | * TurnedAgainstTheirMasters: One of the resistance factions in War of the Chosen is the Skirmishers, ADVENT [[SuperSoldier Super Soldiers]] who've removed their inhibitor chips and are waging a guerrilla war against ADVENT. |
| 848 | * UnfriendlyFire: Both XCOM & ADVENT forces can engage in this. The former is if a soldier's bondmate dies and said soldier goes berserk, or if a soldier panics and has grenades at their disposal. The latter is if they have AOE attacks, [[ArtificialStupidity and their allies are in the radius of said attacks]]. |
| 849 | * TheUnfought: [[spoiler:You never encounter an Ethereal as an enemy in this game. The closest thing you fight in their stead are the Avatars that they pilot, but even those behave much more differently from the Ethereals in the previous game. This is due to their bodies atrophying at an accelerated rate that leaves them so physically frail that they cannot leave the life support vessels located within their secret headquarters.]] |
| 850 | * UniquenessRule: In ''War of the Chosen'', each of the Chosen's bases can only be raided once, so you only have one chance to take each of the Chosen out permanently. If you fail to defeat the Chosen in their base, you will not get another chance, and that Chosen will continue to haunt you for the remainder of the campaign. |
| 851 | * TheUnintelligible: ADVENT forces exclusively communicate in what can only be assumed to be the Elders' StarfishLanguage. Their lines can be subtitled but are never translated regardless, leaving the speaker's tone of voice and their gestures as the only indicator of what they might've said. ''War of the Chosen'' provides a small handful of translated terms, but none of these are ever used by ADVENT forces, so their communication still remains as indecipherable as always. It's also an InUniverse example; Lily Shen remarks at one point that getting the Avenger up and running would've been a whole lot easier if anyone in the Resistance were able to understand the Elder language, so it seems they haven't even made any headway with translating their alphabet in twenty years. |
| 852 | * UnintentionallyUnwinnable: |
| 853 | ** Due to the procedural nature of the missions and the random set of objectives, it's possible (though very rare) for individual missions to be impossible to successfully win. For example, certain missions have you defend a data tap from destruction. If the game spawns on turn 1 an enemy who can inflict the burning status next to the tap, and that enemy manages to activate before you reach him, it's impossible for the player to "heal" the tap and thus end the burning status - meaning it's likely the automatic burning damage each turn will destroy the tap so fast it's not possible to clear out every alien pod on the map before it happens, resulting in a failed mission. |
| 854 | ** In rare cases, the evac zone may be automatically placed on an elevated structure. If said structure is destroyed (even inadvertently, such as by a Sectopod exploding next to it, or an Andromedan walking through it), Bradford will automatically relocate it to a new location, potentially too far away for the squad to reach before the mission timer ticks down. |
| 855 | ** It's possible to freeze [=VIPs=] using the freeze grenade, which prevents you from taking any actions with them. While it's possible to unfreeze them using a medkit, not having one or having already used all the charges during that mission. Even if you ''do'' manage to unfreeze them, though, the game gets a little...wonky. |
| 856 | * {{Unishment}}: Some Dark Events don't make things too difficult at all, and some players actually intend to let them happen in favor of countering far worse events. Some may affect only [[DumpStat Dump Stats]], which makes them all the more harmless. |
| 857 | ** ADVENT Midnight Raids doubles the cost of hiring new recruits. But why hire new recruits when you could just use your old veterans anyway? Plus you could always just buy said recruits around the event, since it doesn't affect the player constantly. |
| 858 | ** Rapid Response simply changes the time when ADVENT reinforcements arrive, since they tend to appear near the end of most missions. |
| 859 | ** Alien Infiltrator is pretty easy to deal with too, since the player should avoid civilians to begin with in guerrilla missions due to them counting as detectors. Plus, even if you do trigger them, it's more Faceless corpses for Mimic Beacons. |
| 860 | ** Lost World may spawn Lost swarms on any mission. While that does add a fair number of additional enemies every now and then, Lost are basically XP on legs due to how harmless and easy to kill they are. In fact, there's no faster way to level up your operatives than encountering and killing as many Lost as possible. |
| 861 | * UnReveal - Following all the story breadcrumbs to the end reveals almost nothing that you couldn't figure out before clicking "New Game". You learn that [[spoiler: you, the commander, are an actual physical being in the game world used to make the alien troops better at strategy. You "learn" that there is some sort completely undefined threat still looming which was scaring the bad guys of this game. And that's about it. The big twist is supposed to be that the aliens are making artificial bodies for themselves out of dead humans, but since the logo of the game is an alien head made of human skulls that's not exactly a surprise. Countless questions go unanswered. Why were the ethereals dying? Why did they need to go through so much trouble to make Avatars instead of using the body of any one of the many slave races, or just a normal human body? How did the aliens have the technology and resources for interstellar travel but still have any trouble at all beating the humans? Where did Bradford get such a neat sweater?]]. |
| 862 | ** Exaggerated with the spectre autopsy, which basically tells you that it *isn't* a swarm of nanobots... and that's it. |
| 863 | * UnstableEquilibrium: The game is notoriously unforgiving at the start in the fact that if you fail your early missions, you will be left struggling later on with inadequate support personnel, lack of supplies, inexperienced troops, and even no troops at all. |
| 864 | * UnstoppableForceMeetsImmovableObject: A situation like this arises when the Assassin attacks an Untouchable Ranger in melee. Untouchable gives the first attack against the Ranger a 100% chance to miss while the Assassin's Katana has a 100% chance to hit. Unfortunately for XCOM, Assassin trumps Ranger in this case. The one and only thing that can protect against an Assassin melee strike is the Templars' Parry ability. |
| 865 | * UnusableEnemyEquipment: |
| 866 | ** Enemy weapons still self-destruct when the user dies, but there's no longer a way to take enemies alive, making it impossible to take their weapons intact. The weapon fragments are no longer a major resource either, you'll just occasionally get a recyclable piece like a stock or power core. XCOM ''only'' uses conventional weapons or ones they figured out how to make themselves by advancing the TechTree. |
| 867 | ** One of the research reports explains that ADVENT weapons, rather than self-destructing, are designed to administer a lethal shock if held by anyone that doesn't have ADVENT DNA. XCOM makes warning the resistance about this fact a high priority. |
| 868 | ** Almost averted at the ending, you see some partisans carrying Mag Rifles (and not the XCOM ones), presumably they are now capable of hacking the weapons for their use. |
| 869 | ** Played with thoroughly, both in and out of universe. The DLC adds customization options including ADVENT helmets [[ColourCodedForYourConvenience with the lights changed to XCOM's blue]], and some of the most popular mods simply unlock ADVENT armor or weaponry to use. |
| 870 | |
| 871 | * UrbanRuins: The War of the Chosen DLC adds missions set in cities that were abandoned and never rebuilt after the war. They're usually uninhabited, apart from hordes of [[OurZombiesAreDifferent The Lost]]. |
| 872 | * UrbanWarfare: Many operations take place in ADVENT-controlled cities. |
| 873 | * UsedFuture: XCOM goes for this look, with the Avenger being a re-purposed alien supply shuttle and the soldiers using duct tape to hold attachments on their weapons. This is contrasted by the ADVENT city centers, which are ''painfully'' clean, clear, bright, and sleek. Exaggerated with the Resistance bases and villages, which are third-world-looking collections of ramshackle huts made from whatever junk is on hand. |
| 874 | * UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans: The ADVENT Administration justifies regular security screenings and troops with assault weapons patrolling throughout cities as just a means of protecting the "perfect future" mankind now enjoys. |
| 875 | * VFormationTeamShot: The wedge team formation option in War of the Chosen's photobooth. |
| 876 | * VariableMix: Music during tactical combat transitions seamlessly from dramatic and orchestral during XCOM's turn, to menacing and electronic during the alien's turn. |
| 877 | * VichyEarth: XCOM canonically lost the war in the first game, a result of Firaxis analyzing players' submitted save data and noting that most playthroughs ended in defeat. As a result, the game starts with Earth under alien occupation with a pro-alien world government imposed. |
| 878 | * VideoGameCaringPotential: Soldiers now have the option of carrying knocked out (and dead) comrades back to the EVAC point but with reduced movement and the inability to fire. While it does obviously have long-term game-play benefits most players will be channeling NoOneGetsLeftBehind. |
| 879 | ** Getting the players to care about their front line troops has long been a part of the franchise, but the rebooted XCOM series kicked it up a notch by allowing players to customize their soldiers to the point where each one can be a completely unique character. As a result, it's actually common for players to construct entire personalized narratives of what's going on as EmergentGameplay and to save scum in order to prevent a favorite soldier's death. This is reflected with the bond mechanic introduced in War of the Chosen, which allows soldiers to form actual emotional ties with one another. |
| 880 | * VideoGameCrueltyPotential: Apart from Retaliations, there is no penalty if a grenade or other HerdHittingAttack, in trying to blow up some aliens and/or their cover, also takes out a few civilians. In fact, there's not even a warning. Sometimes it's even cathartic given that the ones outside Retaliation missions are prone to detecting you when in concealment, or being Faceless when its dark event is active. |
| 881 | ** [[MindControl Mind control]] an unfortunate alien with a grenade and cause it to drop a grenade on its own troops. There's nothing to stop you from doing it, and the alien won't be able to fight back. They won't realize they're killing their own troops. |
| 882 | * VideoGameFlamethrowersSuck: |
| 883 | ** The ones deployed by ADVENT Purifiers suck no matter which side you're on. Burning XCOM soldiers can't do anything but move and shoot (even reloading is disabled), and they suffer consistent burn damage for at least two turns, though burning can be removed on the next turn by hunkering down, walking into water, or being healed by a medkit. While that sounds bad, there are multiple ways to [[NoSell completely nullify]] fire damage. The weapon itself has very short range and fires only in a narrow cone, deals surprisingly low damage to start with, and the wielder has a 50% chance to [[FlamethrowerBackfire explode spectacularly upon death]], which often results in casualties among their own comrades. |
| 884 | ** The two flamethrower types XCOM can issue to soldiers wearing heavy armor are arguably the most useless heavy weapons available to the player. They don't cause much direct damage, their primary effect being damage over time, which is inefficient in a game where killing enemies quickly is essential. Their firing cone is even smaller than the Purifier's (it's almost linear, making it difficult to hit more than one target most of the time), the burst is blocked by high cover, it deals mediocre damage at best and, like all heavy weapons, can only be used once per mission. The game's many robotic enemies are also completely immune to fire damage, making it even more of a liability. For comparison: the ballistic alternative in terms of working principle, the Shredder and the Shredstorm Cannon (basically oversized single-shot shotguns), are more powerful, destroy cover, shred armor, can land critical hits and have a much larger area of effect. |
| 885 | * VillainWorld: Earth under the unity of ADVENT Coalition, forcing XCOM and those who know the truth to be on the run with XCOM operating in the mobile airbase Avenger and people resisting ADVENT living in the wilderness (and some potential recruits are implied to move around place to place), subject to constant raids due to their support to XCOM. |
| 886 | * ViolationOfCommonSense: |
| 887 | ** Enemies get tremendously more difficult to hit the bigger they are. A human-sized trooper is easy pickings if caught in the open, but you have to get pretty lucky for a junior soldier to hit a gatekeeper, which is the size of a small car even if she is standing right next to that alien. In fact, it is harder to hit a sectopod (a walking tank) than it is to hit a superpowered alien ninja from equivalent distance. |
| 888 | ** It is possible to succeed in the Avenger Defense mission and then have [[TotalPartyKill all of your soldiers die afterwards]]. You will end up with an empty roster. |
| 889 | ** Aliens from activated pods will usually focus on killing your troops over attacking the data tap. If you're unlucky enough for two pods to spawn with line of sight on the tap, it may be necessary to activate both so that they go after your troops rather than the tap. |
| 890 | ** Due to the way Concealment and detection works, it is ironically easiest to see if there are hostiles and "sneak" around by deliberately going down open areas for the widest cone of vision. |
| 891 | ** Thanks to the way acid, poison, and fire effects work, if you find yourself in the middle of a pool, cloud, or clump (respectively) of it, order your troops to simply ''stay put'' and heal them. The game only checks status hazards when the hazard first spawns, and then when units move through them, ''not'' for sitting pretty in the middle. |
| 892 | * VoiceOfTheResistance: ''War of the Chosen'' adds a radio station to the Avenger's bar that covers XCOM's recent exploits, drums up support and usually [[ComicRelief lightens the mood]] [[{{Cloudcuckoolander}} in its own special way]]. |
| 893 | * WalkingShirtlessScene: Your male soldiers can become this with the Anarchy's Children DLC, either completely topless or a vest with nothing underneath. |
| 894 | * WallOfWeapons: Crops up here and there. The training center aboard the Avenger has a mild example, and one of the possible rooms in Chosen strongholds is an ADVENT armory with tons of weapons on display. However, the most notable example would be the one in the Avenger's armory that displays the three ''Alien Hunter'' DLC weapons. Every additional tier you unlock shows up there as well. |
| 895 | * WantedPoster: Holographic displays can be found in cities that show wanted posters of your soldiers. There is a unique animation for placing one of your soldiers next to the display, in which they react to seeing themselves on a wanted poster. |
| 896 | * WeAreStrugglingTogether: The Reapers, Skirmishers, and Templar, resistance groups in "War of the Chosen" ''do not'' like each other, with gaining their loyalty and subverting this being one of the campaign objectives. |
| 897 | * WetwareCPU: |
| 898 | ** "Skulljacking" involves forming some Predator-like blades from a gauntlet and jamming them straight into the skull of an enemy ADVENT soldier to hack their brains and (possibly) gain useful intel, at the risk of damaging yourself if you fail. |
| 899 | ** [[spoiler: The Commander has been this for the last ''twenty years'' at the start of the game, being secured in an ADVENT facility with a chip in his/her head that's been using their brain to run tactical simulations, disseminating the data to ADVENT troops to make them more capable on the battlefield.]] |
| 900 | * WhamLine: [[spoiler:Amidst the final mission, a second Ethereal will contact the Commander to tell them to defeat the other Elders "like they did once before." Who is this Ethereal is and why is it helping humanity is unknown though it is implied that it is Asaru from ''Bureau'']]. |
| 901 | * WhatHappenedToTheMouse: |
| 902 | ** We don't learn what becomes of [[spoiler:The Speaker, the leader of VichyEarth]]. We know he survived [[spoiler:(unless the Elders have a dozen Speakers on ice)]] an angry mob storming his stage]] because he still taunts you over the radio, but he remains TheUnfought. On the good side, [[spoiler:The Informant, a.k.a. the Councilman]] gets a BolivianArmyEnding, but his death isn't completely certain. |
| 903 | ** Dr. Vahlen. While occasionally referred to in the game dialogue and strongly hinted to still be alive, no one has heard or seen her in the past 20 years. [[spoiler: Vahlen shows up via logs she recorded about her experiments in the Alien Hunters DLC, and is heavily implied to have survived the overrunning of her lab]]. |
| 904 | * WhatMeasureIsAMook: The ''War of the Chosen'' DLC shows that, while the [=ADVENT=] Troopers might not [[spoiler: actually be human]], they're still as much pawns of the Elders as the rest of us, with some of them even defecting from the [=ADVENT=] cause. |
| 905 | * WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity: The Hunter comments that Psionic users tend to become a tad unhinged the more powerful they are. Considering [[TheFundamentalist The Warlock's]] and [[SmallNameBigEgo Geist's]] (and by extension, [[{{Cult}} The Templars]]) demeanors, he might have a point. |
| 906 | -->'''The Hunter:''' ''If you ask me, these Templars are just as crazy as my brother. What is it about Psionic energy that seems to drive them so completely mad?'' |
| 907 | * WrenchWench: Lily Shen, like her father before her, is XCOM's chief engineer, in charge of maintaining the [[AirborneAircraftCarrier Avenger]], building new facilities, fabricating and repairing equipment, and developing experimental technology. |
| 908 | * YouHaveResearchedBreathing: You need to complete a lengthy research project if you want to use all those GunAccessories looted from dead enemies. While this makes sense with ADVENT's literally alien magnetic and plasma weapons, your ballistic starting weapons sport several very obvious Picatinny-style hardpoints for accessories, something anyone who has ever handled a gun in their life should know how to utilize, but XCOM training apparently doesn't include lessons in how to shove a bigger magazine into an assault rifle. |
| 909 | ** One of the Skirmishers' starting abilities involves using a GrapplingHookGun to [[YouWillNotEvadeMe pull a target towards them]] and strike with a [[WolverineClaws spiked gauntlet]]. ''Substantially later'', the Skirmisher unlocks the ability to just swing the gauntlet at will. |
| 910 | * YouRequireMoreVespeneGas: While Supplies are your most basic currency, Intel is your second currency; harder to come by, but used to secure more precious things like contact with new regions, emergency purchases from the BlackMarket or revealing new upcoming Dark Events. |
| 911 | * YourTerroristsAreOurFreedomFighters: |
| 912 | ** ADVENT propaganda refers to XCOM operations as "terrorist attacks", but of course, XCOM [[TheRevolutionWillNotBeVilified are the good guys in this game]]. |
| 913 | ** This is apparent in gameplay during tactical missions as walking too close to civilians in ADVENT cities will break squad concealment (much like with enemies in the game, but in a much smaller detection radius), jeopardizing your squad's safety and the success of that mission. |
| 914 | * YouShouldntKnowThisAlready: [[spoiler:The ending cutscene reveals that the Elders' atrophying bodies were in the room with you the whole time while you were fighting their Avatars. This of course may lead to you trying to be clever by immediately targeting their sarcophagi in your next campaign. Unfortunately, the damn things are just part of the scenery, so [[ButThouMust you'll have to take down the Avatars the old-fashioned way regardless of your prescience]].]] |
| 915 | * ZergRush: |
| 916 | ** Chryssalids relied on this strategy before, but their new appearance doubles down on this status. Individually they do much less damage and die quicker than their XCOM:EU incarnation, but now they're much better at ambushing and suddenly swarming your troops, and reproduce ''three'' at a time to quickly overwhelm you. |
| 917 | ** Surprisingly, it's the Vipers that play this trope the straightest during the ''Alien Hunters'' DLC. Your team explores what turns out to be a Viper nest, where dozens and dozens of Neonate Vipers will suddenly ambush you from every crevice of the caverns. The neonates are individually extremely weak and are practically fresh out of the egg, but can quickly overwhelm the strike team by sheer number and flanking opportunities. |
| 918 | ** The Lost of the ''War of the Chosen'' DLC attack in mass groups. However, killing a Lost will restore your action, allowing you to quickly get through them if you have enough firepower. |
| 919 | [[/folder]] |
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