My Guide To Power-leveling ;)

[Narog]

Using this method you can get an überteam very early in the game so don't do it if you want to play fair against the alien invaders.

 

 

It's very simple really:

 

1. Go on a mission with some Chrysalises (the more the merrier).

 

2. Do not shoot the Chrysalises, instead avoid them and kill every other mutant in the area (so you don't get surprised during the leveling process ).

 

3. When the area is cleared except for the Chrysalises, lure them to one area of the map.

 

4. Rush all your men EXCEPT ONE right up to the Chrysalises and watch them get paralyzed (this generates XP like nothing else). Oh yeah, don't forget to turn off the auto-pause for critical hits.

 

5. Go have dinner, watch a movie or do something useful for as long as you want. The Chrysalises will go on forever shooting those XP-generating rays.

 

6. Kill the Chrysalises using the soldier you didn't send in to get paralyzed (if you had sent in all soldiers in the beginning they would all have been paralyzed forever...).

 

7. End the mission and start the leveling up.

 

 

Using this method I got over 159000 XP on one mission (6 soldiers, 2 Chrysalises, left it for two hours). My worst soldier was level 4 before the mission. Afterwards he was lvl 18.

[arentol]

A slightly more tedious, but easier to setup, and doable from the second mission on, method of fast leveling is to equip all your guys with shotguns (use shotguns because of the free ammo) and as much ammo as they can hold. Once you kill everything in the level select everyone on your team and start hitting hitting A - Rightclick, A- Rightclick, etc... (about 40-50 times total to start with). Then run time as fast as possible until your team finished firing and then repeat again. You can't damage your own team doing this so it also doesn't matter if you accidentally cause your team to move around if you miss an A before a rightclick.

 

Doing this will net each of your guys around 2k xp every mission.

 

I recommend you do it with your first 3 guys on their first 3 missions. Then every time you collect up another 3 new guys do it again for another 3 missions with the new guys (have the rest of the team carry normal gear to make the missions easier). Once you have either 9 or 12 guys (your preference depending on how many injuries you usually take) then you really don't need to do it any more as you should have enough good men. The reason I suggest doing only 3 missions per character is because you will quickly become overpowered if you do it more than that. (Of course if you are playing on Hard difficulty then you might want to do it for 5 or 6 missions per character).

[quasarstrider]

Kewl stuff. I had already done the Chrysalid trick about 3x, watched the entire evening news on TV each time.

 

That was how I got 3 guys with HEROIC carrying capacity and good stats elsewhere (my lovely pack mules), 3 guys with HEROIC speed & handguns, etc.

 

Node Watchers also do Paralysis so it is likely you can use the same trick, but I haven't tried it there yet.

 

The other trick is new to me. Gotta try it on the next mission, my pack mules can carry plenty of shotguns in their backpack. :inlove:

[Kal Cyann]

nice lill explot, gonna have to try that 1 outmyself

[arentol]

Actually it's not lots of shotguns you need.. it's lots of ammo.

[Viktor]

I think this was changed in new patch cause i did it for half an hour and only got 3750xp and I did exactly what you said. So I think the patch fixes this I may be wrong but I know it did not work for me.

[quasarstrider]

Just spent some boring time shooting all the shotgun shells all my men could carry. Got slightly over 10000 xp for my trouble, 3 guys leveled up. Not that bad.

[Cpl. Facehugger]

What version are you using quasarstrider?

[quasarstrider]

V1.2. Playing on HARD.

 

It was quite boring. Did one of those easy peasy transgenant missions, brought one shotgun and all the shotgun ammo I could carry (besides some regular weapons and ammo to actually finish the mission, shotguns are lame). Then I spent some 15 mins doing 'A', right-click, 'A', right-click... give shotgun to someone else, rinse and repeat.

 

My fingers got a bit sore, but they are ok now.

 

I wonder if Uzis are better. I think they have more ammo per clip, so you can make loads & loads of AIMED firings. I'm assuming the XP is just per shot and has nothing to do with damage or anything.

 

But my fingers ache just from the thought.

[Kal Cyann]

Uzis r ammo proper ammo hogs, i EQed 3 of my team in the beginning missions for a practice run an all 3 ran outa ammo before i finished mission. They were on burst like

[S..]

Just a quick question, when a guy levels up from 4 to 18 normally, you get to improve his/her stats 14 times in the mean time (that's if you're leveling up properly ) but if you level up like narog or arentol said, do you get to improve the stats 14 times, or can u just improve one stat like normal? coz that would make it pretty pointless, as u'd have a level 18 guy, but it wouldn't mean anything as he'd have the same sort of skill range as a level 5 guy Just wondering, coz I've never had anyone level up more than one level per mission heh

 

S..

[Narog]

Just a quick question, when a guy levels up from 4 to 18 normally, you get to improve his/her stats 14 times in the mean time (that's if you're leveling up properly ) but if you level up like narog or arentol said, do you get to improve the stats 14 times, or can u just improve one stat like normal? coz that would make it pretty pointless, as u'd have a level 18 guy, but it wouldn't mean anything as he'd have the same sort of skill range as a level 5 guy Just wondering, coz I've never had anyone level up more than one level per mission heh

 

S..

You get to level up 14 times in a row. None of my soldiers have less than super-heroic in their main skill.

[arentol]

Here is what I do..

 

I have every guy who needs XP equip a shotgun and otherwise carry all ammo. Meanwhile the guys who don't need XP carry rifles, medkits, grenades, as much rifle ammo as they should need, and then as much shotgun ammo as they can.

 

Then when I enter the mission (or the second phase of the mission if it has two phases) I immediately group up the XP team and get them set up with a long cycle of shotgun firing. Then I complete the mission with the non-XP team and come back and dump my ammo on the ground for the XP team to pick up and use.

 

Generally I get all my guys up to level 9 or 10 (3-4 sessions per guy) this way and then quit doing it and rely on normal methods for leveling. It also speeds things up to make sure your guys speed is raised up to good or better as soon as possible so they fire faster.

 

 

Using an UZI doesn't really work because for some reason you get less xp per shot on aimed and it takes a long time to go through a clip on aimed. Also burst gives a LOT less xp too. Shotguns have pretty much been tested to be the most efficient free ammo weapon for this purpose. Also UZI ammo weighs more and will reduce everyone carrying very much of it to AWFUL speed.

[Azxel]

tried out that Chrysalid XP trick.

 

what i did was cleared the whole place of other aliens (as mentioned) and after that the game gave the option to end or continue, hence moved all my men towards the Chrysalids and left them there overnight. woke up. click abandon mission and all my men got out OK... with loads of xp

 

no need to save one man to take out the Chrysalids.

also your men can move after a few turns, when the paralysis affect stops. just place some of your men at the edge of the Chrysalid's range, and you should be able to move your men out of their range to kill em if when the affects wears off... you wont be paralyse forever.

 

one thing i did was save my Chrysalid XPing time periodically and this cause the game to have a fatal error. upon restarting, I got the same fatal error again and had to reload another save (whew! thank God i saved another earlier)

[LongTooth]

Using this method you can get an überteam very early in the game so don't do it if you want to play fair against the alien invaders.

 

 

It's very simple really:

 

1. Go on a mission with some Chrysalises (the more the merrier).

 

2. Do not shoot the Chrysalises, instead avoid them and kill every other mutant in the area (so you don't get surprised during the leveling process ).

 

3. When the area is cleared except for the Chrysalises, lure them to one area of the map.

 

4. Rush all your men EXCEPT ONE right up to the Chrysalises and watch them get paralyzed (this generates XP like nothing else). Oh yeah, don't forget to turn off the auto-pause for critical hits.

 

5. Go have dinner, watch a movie or do something useful for as long as you want. The Chrysalises will go on forever shooting those XP-generating rays.

 

6. Kill the Chrysalises using the soldier you didn't send in to get paralyzed (if you had sent in all soldiers in the beginning they would all have been paralyzed forever...).

 

7. End the mission and start the leveling up.

 

 

Using this method I got over 159000 XP on one mission (6 soldiers, 2 Chrysalises, left it for two hours). My worst soldier was level 4 before the mission. Afterwards he was lvl 18.

I do the same thing but take out all the mutans first stunning the chrysalises but killing all others then when ready I heal the chrysalises with a medi pack