KickStarter Phoenix Point - the new game from X-COM creator Julian Gollop

[ArchAngel]

ArchAngel

Why haven't they touched melee?
Or at least the interaction with Rapid Clearance.

They didn't have time to go into skill nerfs. That is planned for a bigger future patch although we got no clue what exactly are they looking to change. We only know they are looking at a wider range of skills to nerf or change.
As far as Rapid Clearance most people in CC want to see it changed so it cannot be abused with 1 AP attacks.

Probably enough, just limit it to 1 AP in that case.

How do you deal with the hoplites?
Easy enough currently to kill all of them with melee/RC, but outside of it they're a huge pain.

Snipers and grenade launchers

 

[ArchAngel]

What is the recommended difficulty level at this stage of the game?

If you played other Xcom like at hardest difficulty you can play this one on Legendary as well. If not you might want to start on Veteran first.

 

[Visperas]

Well, I finally started the game and I'm having fun with it. Everything was pretty smooth until I had my first Haven Defense mission.

- The mission said that the attackers power was 10 and the defenders was 22 but in the mission itself there were 7 or 8 attackers and 3 defenders. I understand that those values will never represent the amount of enemy and friendly units in the map, right? That was a bit frustrating but now I know and will take it into account. I assume the only way to know the difficulty of a mission is to fly there and check. Can you check in any other way? Also, if you wait some time and the attackers power decreases, will the mission be easier?

- That fight lasted for 4 or 5 turns, maybe 6. Those 3 defenders only took action in 1 of those turns. The rest of the time did NOTHING at all. Like, bugged nothing, standing out of cover. Was that specific map bugged? Should I expect that every time?

- Out of curiosity, I checked the Diplomacy missions and they appeared in the quest list but there was no target. Does that mean that I haven't found the haven they want to attack? Will it show once I discover it?

 

[ArchAngel]

Well, I finally started the game and I'm having fun with it. Everything was pretty smooth until I had my first Haven Defense mission.

- The mission said that the attackers power was 10 and the defenders was 22 but in the mission itself there were 7 or 8 attackers and 3 defenders. I understand that those values will never represent the amount of enemy and friendly units in the map, right? That was a bit frustrating but now I know and will take it into account. I assume the only way to know the difficulty of a mission is to fly there and check. Can you check in any other way? Also, if you wait some time and the attackers power decreases, will the mission be easier?

- That fight lasted for 4 or 5 turns, maybe 6. Those 3 defenders only took action in 1 of those turns. The rest of the time did NOTHING at all. Like, bugged nothing, standing out of cover. Was that specific map bugged? Should I expect that every time?

- Out of curiosity, I checked the Diplomacy missions and they appeared in the quest list but there was no target. Does that mean that I haven't found the haven they want to attack? Will it show once I discover it?

1. Enemy and defender strength has two purposes. One is that if defender strength is greater haven will defend itself and you only go there to get some resources, XP and reputation by helping. Enemy Strength determines Threat Level of the mission which is what you want to know. It goes from Low to Extreme. Threat level determines number and strength of enemies waiting for you there.
2. Allied AI (almost) never does anything on turn 1, probably to make the fight harder. Then later they try to do their best by reaching enemy. Take into account those are probably lvl 1 human soldiers, their stats are crap which means they probably use up all their AP into movement. Later as their levels grows so does their usefulness. And it is normal that human AI likes to stand in the open a lot. Their AI is weaker than pandoran AI. Also if this was Haven Defense where you need to rescue civilians, human defenders will panic a lot as pandorans start killing civilians. As I said Lvl 1 soldiers have crap stats and that includes willpoints which defend vs panic.
3. I am not sure what is your question here. Diplomacy screen will show those factions that you have come in contact with and will let you either take on generic mission or show you locations of story missions for factions. If you accept one of their generic missions it usually says Sabotage food/tech/materials/research from faction X, that means you need to find any Haven of that faction X that has the building that produces what they want sabotaged and then go do that.

 

[Visperas]

Well, I finally started the game and I'm having fun with it. Everything was pretty smooth until I had my first Haven Defense mission.

- The mission said that the attackers power was 10 and the defenders was 22 but in the mission itself there were 7 or 8 attackers and 3 defenders. I understand that those values will never represent the amount of enemy and friendly units in the map, right? That was a bit frustrating but now I know and will take it into account. I assume the only way to know the difficulty of a mission is to fly there and check. Can you check in any other way? Also, if you wait some time and the attackers power decreases, will the mission be easier?

- That fight lasted for 4 or 5 turns, maybe 6. Those 3 defenders only took action in 1 of those turns. The rest of the time did NOTHING at all. Like, bugged nothing, standing out of cover. Was that specific map bugged? Should I expect that every time?

- Out of curiosity, I checked the Diplomacy missions and they appeared in the quest list but there was no target. Does that mean that I haven't found the haven they want to attack? Will it show once I discover it?

1. Enemy and defender strength has two purposes. One is that if defender strength is greater haven will defend itself and you only go there to get some resources, XP and reputation by helping. Enemy Strength determines Threat Level of the mission which is what you want to know. It goes from Low to Extreme. Threat level determines number and strength of enemies waiting for you there.
2. Allied AI (almost) never does anything on turn 1, probably to make the fight harder. Then later they try to do their best by reaching enemy. Take into account those are probably lvl 1 human soldiers, their stats are crap which means they probably use up all their AP into movement. Later as their levels grows so does their usefulness. And it is normal that human AI likes to stand in the open a lot. Their AI is weaker than pandoran AI. Also if this was Haven Defense where you need to rescue civilians, human defenders will panic a lot as pandorans start killing civilians. As I said Lvl 1 soldiers have crap stats and that includes willpoints which defend vs panic.
3. I am not sure what is your question here. Diplomacy screen will show those factions that you have come in contact with and will let you either take on generic mission or show you locations of story missions for factions. If you accept one of their generic missions it usually says Sabotage food/tech/materials/research from faction X, that means you need to find any Haven of that faction X that has the building that produces what they want sabotaged and then go do that.

1. Ok. So, Attacker power 10 is medium Threat Level. Will the Threat Level and/or Attacker power go down if I let time pass in the Geoscape insted of going there right away?

2. What you're describing is not what happened in that fight so I'm hoping it slightly bugged or something. Those friendlies did absolutely nothing at all except for one turn where they shot the enemies, the rest of the turns they just skipped, no movement, no shooting, nothing.

3. Ah... The key part here is any haven that has the building targeted. Gotcha!

Thanks a lot!!

 

[Parabalus]

Ok. So, Attacker power 10 is medium Threat Level. Will the Threat Level and/or Attacker power go down if I let time pass in the Geoscape insted of going there right away?

Both go down, though depending on how lopsided the power balance is the stronger might only barely budge.

What you're describing is not what happened in that fight so I'm hoping it slightly bugged or something. Those friendlies did absolutely nothing at all except for one turn where they shot the enemies, the rest of the turns they just skipped, no movement, no shooting, nothing.

Sounds bugged, usually they shoot at least once a turn. Best bet is to activate them, so you can get direct control.

Ah... The key part here is any haven that has the building targeted. Gotcha!

Note that you can attack any Haven building for your own benefit, regardless of missions. Worth it, especially stealing aircraft.

 

[ArchAngel]

I am now doing a proper new run with DLC3 while also using all other DLCs. Air combat certainly forces you to play differently. You cannot just roam around ignoring the Behemoth, you always need at least one ship close by, if nothing so you can defend raids on your own base.
And new Myrmidon unit is very good, it you ignore them they will fuck up your soldiers. They do bring something new to the battlefield.

 

[Mazisky]

I am now doing a proper new run with DLC3 while also using all other DLCs. Air combat certainly forces you to play differently. You cannot just roam around ignoring the Behemoth, you always need at least one ship close by, if nothing so you can defend raids on your own base.
And new Myrmidon unit is very good, it you ignore them they will fuck up your soldiers. They do bring something new to the battlefield.

Are the environments more varied now with the "full" package? I remember at release it was all grey\brown wasteland and some city.

It may be not important for some but for me it's essential to have visual variety in 60+ hrs campaigns

 

[ArchAngel]

I am now doing a proper new run with DLC3 while also using all other DLCs. Air combat certainly forces you to play differently. You cannot just roam around ignoring the Behemoth, you always need at least one ship close by, if nothing so you can defend raids on your own base.
And new Myrmidon unit is very good, it you ignore them they will fuck up your soldiers. They do bring something new to the battlefield.

Are the environments more varied now with the "full" package? I remember at release it was all grey\brown wasteland and some city.

It may be not important for some but for me it's essential to have visual variety in 60+ hrs campaigns

Yes, DLCs added new maps.

 

[Visperas]

I'm having a great time with this game. It's obviously not perfect but it's still a lot of fun.

 

[Infinitron]

 

[Alienman]

More god damn aliens. Going to be really hard to counter the doomclock with all these weird minor factions.

 

[geno]

But to end humanity SOMETIMES it just takes one mistake

 

[mediocrepoet]

But to end humanity SOMETIMES it just takes one mistake

This is like the 10th time humanity was ended. We're just lucky that God is a save scummer.

 

[spectre]

So, seems like I'm a bit late to the party with this one, but decided after all the updates it might just be ready to take it for a spin.
First impression, it came a long way from the tech demo I played back then, but still feels unfinished. To the point that I'm contemplating shutting off the entire Festering Skies DLC. It feels half-baked at this point.
it reminded me a lot of the Ufo After_____ series, similar setup, similar set of secondary factions. Also seems to inherit the narrative-driven structure from these games with lots of tedious research and geoscape-hopping just to push through toward the next progress point.
I still can't shake the feeling that it's heavily modded excom, but to give it justice, I'm enjoying it a lot more with 4AP and a more detailed inventory.
I actually like a lot of things I'm seeing. Bullet trajectories remind me of how weapons in the original ufos behaved, it also tends to avoid nonsensical rng shooting EXCUM was notorious for.
I like how they integrated the free-aim into the rest of the game's mechanic, rather than making it a cheap gimmick. Shooting off brainsuckers off your squadmantes is a nice touch, so is taking apart gargantuan aliens by hacking off their body parts.
I also liked how the opponents evolve to keep up with my guys. Felt like a logical and incremental progress rather than - this alien now wears a yellow shirt and will have double the HP - I've had my fill of this in xenonauts an am not a fan.

One thing that wore me down pretty quick was how repetitive the maps and missions are. On my first restart, despite putting me on a totally different landmass, it felt like I was tediously retracing my steps doing same shit on the same maps.
I don't see myself mustering the strength for a third attempt anytime soon. Bit of a shame, cause I'm seeing plenty of good ideas. Unfortunately, what I'm not seeing is getting it all together as a coherent game.
It is functional as a game, but still feels thrown-together and drawn-out more than it should be.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

basically any mission where I have to get to a point as fast as possible(which is a solid 80% of them) my main thought is "gee, I wish all my characters had jump jets"
it's not just the massive distance they can cross, but the fact that it puts them out of reach of being attacked most of the time too

 

[Parabalus]

Later on most characters are faster than jump jets, be sure to have Frenzy on all the time.

 

[ArchAngel]

It is open ended gameplay on purpose. But yes, story missions are mostly the same. Only type of enemies are going to change depending on when you go do the mission.

 

[spectre]

IIRC, jump jets are just a fixed 20-range jump. That's quite a lot in the beginning, but as you progress - putting a few points in speed as well as adding Assault class for Dash gives you better mobility and flexibility, better still if you got Quarterback for even moar speed.
The cool factor of jump jets is of course undeniable, though I think eating up 3 AP up front is a real bummer. Would be nice to drop in and be able to swing the big hammer. There are some good looking legs under Advanced Bionics, btw.

And speaking of swinging the big hammer, one thing I'm having trouble getting my head around is why am I getting better damage output from bashing crab people with an autocannon (only costing 1 AP to boot)
than with a dedicated melee weapon? Seems like cqb is still up for some rebalancing.

 

[Trithne]

IIRC, jump jets are just a fixed 20-range jump. That's quite a lot in the beginning, but as you progress - putting a few points in speed as well as adding Assault class for Dash gives you better mobility and flexibility, better still if you got Quarterback for even moar speed.
The cool factor of jump jets is of course undeniable, though I think eating up 3 AP up front is a real bummer. Would be nice to drop in and be able to swing the big hammer. There are some good looking legs under Advanced Bionics, btw.

And speaking of swinging the big hammer, one thing I'm having trouble getting my head around is why am I getting better damage output from bashing crab people with an autocannon (only costing 1 AP to boot)
than with a dedicated melee weapon? Seems like cqb is still up for some rebalancing.

Melee damage is based on the weight of the item being used. So autocannons and the hel cannon are the best things to bash with.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

On one hand, it definitely feels a lot better than it did the last time I played. It's pretty much an improvement over XCOM/XCOM 2 in every way. Extreme enemy variation due to mutations, I'm actually not sure if these are premade or being randomly generated similar to say, Spore. There's a lot of good new mechanics over XCOM/2 -- most obvious are manual shot placement and per-bullet calculation. I like the vehicles, but they don't seem too good tbh.
On the other hand, I feel like there's way too much going on at the same time due to all the stuff they've added. Basically every time I unpause I get a new cutscene due to content explosion, I can't keep track of it all.
On the gripping hand, air combat is complete ass. What were they thinking?

eh, I give it an official Rusty "It's decent enough" Recommendation. If you liked nu-XCOM/nu-XCOM 2 I don't see why you wouldn't like this.

I'd really prefer a game like this except at a bit more of a micro level where you control one unit in Phoenix squad rather than controlling every minute detail.

 

[LESS T_T]

 

[Shog-goth]

No matter how many layers you can wrap around a turd, it still remains a turd.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

I still don't understand how to beat any flying enemy that has a psychic DoT attack. It just damages everything at the same time and can't be avoided.

 

[Parabalus]

I still don't understand how to beat any flying enemy that has a psychic DoT attack. It just damages everything at the same time and can't be avoided.

Try killing that part first, directly targeting its body to destroy it faster, or going with a high HP ship. But usually for the later fliers you need to attack them with multiple ships.