The Firaxis XCOM Series

A short horror story in three pictures.◊

And that is why people who make mods to make the game even harder should be lined up and shot by firing squad.

This is XCOM. The firing squad would miss all of them.

Then we'd break out the guaranteed splash damage.

Are you really sure about that?

Avoiding even the prospect of this is why my campaigns always prioritize getting as many Mimic Beacons as possible as quickly as possible. Even Gatekeepers can't resist the taunt mechanic.

Back to Enemy Unknown again.

What the FUCK is flanking. I've had it explained like a billion times and don't understand it one bit.

It's when you get behind their cover.

EDIT: Just realised that's not a particularly helpful place to leave it.

To elaborate: Whenever a unit gets behind cover in the game, that piece of cover provides that unit a defense bonus against shooting attacks that are coming from the other side of the cover. Flanking is when a unit crosses over so that the target it is attacking does not get the benefit of that cover.

Edited by disruptorfe404 on Feb 1st 2019 at 5:00:37 AM

And how do I know when that's happening? It just seems to happen completely out of the blue if at all.

It's when a shooter has line of sight to an opposing unit with no cover blocking view of said opposing unit. The game has an oversimplified check where it just draws a line from the cover and sees if the shooter is inside or outside of it.

If a Muton is crouched next to a chest-high wall, and you shoot at it from somewhere on the other side of that wall, the Muton is in cover and is going to be harder to hit. If you move a unit so that your soldier is on the same side of the wall as that Muton, the Muton is no longer in cover and will be easier to hit, with an increased chance of landing a critical hit for bonus damage.

Or you can think of it like cars. If an enemy "car" is parked with its front bumper against some obstacle, you're gonna want to position your soldiers to try to shoot it in the doors.

[quoteblock]It's when a shooter has line of sight to an opposing unit with no cover blocking view of said opposing unit. The game has an oversimplified check where it just draws a line from the cover and sees if the shooter is inside or outside of it.[/quoteblock]

In English, please?

Draw a line from the target to the attacker. If that line doesn't pass through a wall directly next to the target, the target is flanked.

Then how does it keep happening without rhyme or reason? I jump all around and somehow I suddenly have a yellow shield on me.

Twentington is this you having legit difficulty or is this you trolling like with Skyrim?

This is me having legit no idea what's going on. It seems every time I move, the aliens hit me out of nowhere before I can even react. I've looked up so many tutorials, and none of them can give me a clear definition of flanking, or how it happens.

I made this in paint in like 30 seconds.

Your soldiers have to be standing on the square directly next to an object to be in cover. If they're not, then they're not in cover and count as flanked. If the enemy is to the side of the cover, that's also flanked. Also remember that enemies have legs and may decide to move to the side of your soldier's cover when it's their turn.

Why do I keep getting randomly attacked by previously-unseen aliens before I even have a chance to react?

If it 'keeps happening', I'm willing to wager that the aliens are flanking you by moving around your cover. Is that the case?

How would I know? I literally don't see them ANYWHERE on the map until they attack me. (I.e., it'll just show "alien activity" and nothing happens. Next turn, I move and SURPRISE ALIEN)

That's literally impossible. In the old MS DOS games, yeah, but here aliens' line of sight and yours are roughly the same and they can't shoot you unless they're on screen. The only exception is terror missions where they can shoot civillians while offscreen.

So I get the feeling you're trolling again. That or your situational awareness and short-term memory are so bad that it legally constitutes a disability.

Also what he said.

Edited by Dirtyblue929 on Jan 31st 2019 at 8:26:19 AM

Is this a case where the last soldier you move gets eyes-on a group of aliens, "activating" them, and since that ends your turn you immediately eat plasma during the aliens' turn?

'cause that's not flanking screwing you over, that's careless movement.

I somehow finished without much damage. Now I'm back at the base. Now what?

Oh no, I know where this is going. "How do I research? It's not doing anything!" "What do you mean 'scan'? HOW DO I DO THAT?" "Okay, I'm doing what you said. Nothing is happening. How do I do the next mission?! This game sucks!"

Edited by Dirtyblue929 on Jan 31st 2019 at 8:28:07 AM

Seriously, what do I do? The game didn't tell me anything after I beat the last mission.