What's your setup?

[Munkeylord]

well i was just wondering out of the little section of weapons' i've made what everybody uses, if you use them. just want to know what everyone's prefered weapons are or would be prefered weapons. simply state your rifle/heavy cannon and tell me why you like them.

[BreakMage]

EDIT: I don't use any weapons mods until I beat the game just ONCE on Beginner, then I'll use your stuff. It's just my code of gaming, beat it regular, then mod it to your hearts content. Sorry it's not REALLY your mods though, Munkeylord.

 

It depends on the situation. Most of the stuff is the same, but here:

 

Crashed UFO, depends on size:

Laser Rifles are the perfect balance between ammunition and power. Well, not really, but they do it well enough. No point in wasting clips when I don't need to, and they help the newbies get accuracy.

Heavy Plasma is needed for Mutons, Ethereals, or anything in general that needs stopping power. (EG, Terror Units)

 

Research:

When I was abducting Aliens for research, I also had two Mind Probes to identify possible aliens for capture, and two Small Launchers for taking them with me. Then, I just kill the rest.

 

Always:

I always have at least 3 medikits per team, There have been numerous times where I could have not lost anyone if I could have just stopped the Fatal wounds from bleeding out.

All of my guys carry at least one Alien Veggie of Doom™ if there is ever an oppurtunity to use them. Personally, I like shooting aliens more. Though En Kay Eff has taught me the light in using grenades.

 

Heavy Assault:

In Base Raids, Battleships, and Cydonia (If I ever get there, once)

Blaster Launchers are excellent at taking out Sectopods, and clustered groups of aliens. They are also useful in dealing with Ethereals before you have psionics. (EG: Fire them at blind points and hope you hear a scream or kaboom from a sectopod)

 

I should use motion detectors more, but I don't. Once I have everyones Psi Strength evaluated (Only one more month! Bwahahaha!) then I will use Psi Amps to "help" my units with Panic attacks gain morale, and just Mind Control aliens, have them drop their weapons, and just be target practice for pistols, to improve firing accuracy and reactions.

 

I think that covers my list... Oh, I used to use Electro Flares until I noticed the Aliens could see my units. So, I kinda stopped using those.

[richy]

at the moment i stay with qquite boring stuff, each troop has: laser rifle. prox grenade. and alien grenade. i enerally keep that kinda thing right through. sometimes using a few Hev plasma when apropriate B-Bombs dont give the the same satisfaction as blasting away with laser fire.

 

also i will say if i get attacked with Psionics (etherial/sectoid) then laser fire isnt likely to do much Vs flying suits.. so a few men lost to mind control just whittles out the weak, leaving the stronger Psi guys for me.

[The Demi-Godly One]

My guys just have laser rifles, a psi-amp, a stun-rod and some grenades.

[Rattler]

Beginning Game

 

Rifle with 2 extra clips in the shoulders or a auto/heavy cannon with explosive ammo

Pistol on the belt

1 Gernade and 1 Proxi on the belt

1 Medikit

 

Middle Game

Laser Rifle

Laser Pistol on the belt

1 Alien Gernade 1 Proxi on the belt

1 Medikit

 

End Game

Heavy Plasma with 8 extra clips in the shoulders and ankle pockets

Laser Pistol/Plasma Pistol on the belt

and then the same as before

 

My one guy special forces level guy carries 2 Heavy Plasmas so he doesn't get caught while reloading

[Jman4117]

Most of the squad carries a laser rifle, 2 grenades, and 1 proximity grenade.

The two point men either have heavy plasmas or auto cannons (with HE).

Two of the guys near the back carry a blaster launcher and laser pistol.

[NKF]

I'm quite fond of using the pistols in the game (a strange obsession, I agree), despite them being utterly useless against heavy armour. It's mostly a direct result of having experienced a few terribly disadvantaged missions where I complete the mission (rather successfully considering the odds) and end up thinking "Wow, did I just do that?".

 

I think I identify most with the laser pistol. Its got the fastest autoshot in the game (although, admittingly, the least accurate autoshot), does more than twice the damage a normal pistol can dish out, and it can kill any alien, (eventually) except superhuman level sectopods (unless you get a chance to shoot at it from underneath, which is rare). Blah blah blah, I suppose I could go on and on. It's not the best of weapons, but it certainly has a fighting chance against most of the early terror units you end up facing.

 

One of my other favourites has got to be the stun launcher. Though its rather slow and clunky, and is used primarily for capturing reseach critical aliens, it simply massacres large terror units. Try firing a round or two at a tight cluster of sectopods or cyberdiscs some time. You'd be surprised. The bomb might not always work on the first try, since the sectopods and cyberdiscs have good armour, and this gives them a chance to nullify the paralysis effects.

 

The heavy/auto cannons are also excellent weapons I keep using for a while, even after I'm well into the game and have heavy plasmas and blasters. The heavy/auto cannon's primary asset would have to be the HE and IN rounds. I use it mainly for attacking aliens that are standing on the floor immediately above me -- be it in a barn or a UFO. Works wonders I tell you. Oh, and as long as you're wearing power armour, you won't even feel the backlash of your own shells when firing a few rounds of HE into an alien standing right next to you.

 

Hmm, I suppose a complicated and heavy looking futuristic rifle that takes three clips: A laser cell with infinite ammunition (or a high amount of limited charges.), a small belt of high explosive shells and a stun bomb would make a marvellous all-round weapon. Of course, I realise there's absolutely no hope in developing one that needs to be towed about by a truck...

 

- NKF

[Jman4117]

You could mod one

I'm not sure about the laser but you could have AP, HE and stun.

[Munkeylord]

well its possible to make that, though the laser won't show up as a laser but it will have a laser effect for the damage. and you can make it as light as a feather if nessesary, maybe its made out of poly carbonate matterials or something...................would you want one?

[NKF]

Not really. It was just an idea.

 

- NKF

[Morsey]

Laser rifles all the way. I research like crazy to get them to replace the rifles. No ammo trouble and low cost of auto fire.

The only heavy weapon I bother with is the missile launcher with way points.

I dont usually bother with grenades either.

As soon as I get 4 guys who are trained well with psi all the rest get ditched and the rest of the skyranger room taken up with hover tanks. I've played the game about 4 times and keep drifting towards these tactics.

[Munkeylord]

well heres what i usually use, i have my units armed and supported pretty much like a real military unit would.

 

anyone not carrying a support weapon (auto cannon or missle launcher) has a rifle, an extra mag, 2 grenades and a sidearm.

 

if i have lasers i don't use normal rifles but the support troops have laser pistols.

 

but i use grenades alot, and put out plenty of fire with the support units to give cover for the advancing rifle men who clear the way.

[Jman4117]

Grenades are great. Very useful to use a high explosive charge to take out the alien leaders in large ufo's. They usually stay in one place for the entire mission so they can be killed pretty easily.

[ignore my tentacles]

laser rifles, hvy plasma guns and grenades sees me through thick 'n' thin generally. A few 'specials' distributed amonst the more talented members of my squad ensure a nice spread of firepower. Generally I keep the initial loadout for the 'dropship' to include a lot of earth manufactured -or exclusive- goods- stuff I'm not gonna be able to prise out of the cold, stiff clutches of a dead alien.

 

I'm a little disappointed at the mo', I was just about to invade Cydonia with a full avenger squad of highly experienced psionic troops, armed only with plasma pistol, a 'nade (le pomme du terre explosiv) and a psi-amp. I wanted to see if I could create a zombie sectoid/ethereal army to fight with. It's the same old story: Computer suffers technical probs, user upgrades computer, computer decides it's not filthying its delicate new chipset by running such archaic code, user cries.

 

tsk.

 

see ya in the support forums!

[Jman4117]

In my current game, I am using laser rifles for most troopers. I have about six snipers armed with heavy lasers, they give long range support as the riflemen patrol the area. Seems to work better than using auto cannons at close range. I've had a few guys who could get at least 2 out of 3 shots across the map. I've had very few casualties with this tactic.

[Fqubed]

Cmon i know somenone here beats it with only human weps from the start.

 

My setup from start to finish has been autocannon with HE IN rounds, rocket launcher with big rockets stun rod in backpack lots of High Explosive packs and granades (smoke prox and standard), medi kit and scanner on half the troops (cmon medkits and scaners should be standard)

By the time you get to Cydonia you have made the absolute best troops that there can be. (if it takes ou more then 9 ingame months odds are you are toast)

 

Well thats me

F3

[NKF]

Only human tech eh? Reminds me of some of the self imposed scenarios I tried after reading Scott Jones's XComutil scenarios.

 

I went all out with grenades with the occasional pistol or laser pistol (x1) to deal with units in the air where there weren't any conveniently placed flat surfaces. Stun rods for the three primary research aliens. Went pretty far with that campaign, though I never finished it despite having the option to. Didn't have many super soldiers, but I did value the soldiers with plenty of 'strength', and then there were the occasional 'accidents' with pre-primed grenades.

 

Really learned to appreciate the use of grenades in the game after that. Ordinary guns are good and all, but a grenade can be tossed over a wall without destroying it (when thrown, when it hits the ground, well, that's a different story entirely ).

 

Then I tried playing it entirely with high explosive shells and large rockets. Woo! A real barrel of fun that was. Good thing the X-Com battlescape isn't as deformable as the ones in Scorched Earth or the entire range of Worms games were... You know what's funny? I realise that I hadn't noticed the chryssalid's resistance to HE while playing this campaign. It was only in a more recent campaign where I watched in horror as a Chryssalid kept advancing on one of my soldiers as he kept pumping HC-HE shells into it, and it just wouldn't go down. Thank goodness the last magazine was filled with AP bullets...

 

- NKF

[Jman4117]

Fqubed: I use human weapons for about 90% of the game. In the end the only alien tech I use is the blaster launcher, psiamp, and plasma cannon craft weapon. May have have plasma rifles on mars but usually lasers. I don't even bother with things like alien grenades and mind probes, because I would use more than I could capture and would have build them using up elerium. High explosives and proximity grenades are better anyway.

[NKF]

If you play the way you play now, and mix the alien grenades in just to use them up, you shouldn't run out too quickly. More often than not, I end up selling off alien tech since I just cannot get rid of it fast enough.

 

As for the mind probes --- they're reusable, so you'll never ever run out. I keep one or two (per dropship) for the entire campaign and sell off the rest (they've got a good sale price). Useful though they are, they are terribly time consuming. 50% of your TUs for a single use and you need to turn and face the direction of the alleged mind probe 'victim' for it to work. Its because of this I keep such a low number of them, and I usually let reserve troops that hang back in the Skyranger operate the probes to keep them busy even though they're not out in the field.

 

- NKF

[Munkeylord]

hehehe, i don't use mind probes at all............instead i manufacture them and sell them off, you can make a huge profit if you do that with any alien tech, or even other items you can't buy in the purchase/hire menu. alien alloys is probably the best thing to manufacture and sell cause it only costs money to make them and you get the money back after its sold and then some.

[Jman4117]

You should only do that if you have a massive stockpile of elerium. Laser cannons and medkits will also give large profits without using resources.

[BubbleLabby]

I usually use the following setup;

 

4 soldiers and 2 tanks.

Solders: laser rifle, two grenade, one proximity grenade, one smoke grenade.

Laser rifle; a fairly accurate and speedy weapon.

Grenade; use for distraction.

Proximity grenade; it is a mouse trap.

Smoke grenade; cover my track.

Tank; scouting.

 

extra; the soldiers pick up dead enemies' grenades.

 

Sometimes, I use 6 to 8 soldiers, with may be one tank.