Base Raid Gone Bad

[Alpha_Monkey]

Christ.

 

I don't normally post anecdotes from my missions, but this one was truly spectacular, and reminded me exactly how tense and bowel-stirring this game can be. Hell, it'd make a great fanfic.....

 

Lemme take a moment to set the scene....

 

The date is September 17th, 1999, and the war has just picked up in intensity.

Short on supplies, I've resorted to allowing an alien base to be set up in Siberia, so I can poach equipment and Elerium from their periodical supply drops. Meanwhile, despite my best efforts, the Battle of South Africa (which had been waging for a week) was lost when the Xenos commited 3 battleships in a concentrated assault. With my fighters overwhelmed, Nigeria was promtly infiltrated and occupied by Ethereal vagrants in a new outpost.

 

Due to the nature of the new threat in Africa (and with the end of the month coming up), my elite 1st Squad was dispatched to wipe out the base utterly, while 2nd Squad (under Colonel Mosovich, my Xcom 2nd-in-command) was sent on a mission to capture a Snakeman Commander.

I'd spent the last two weeks hitting their supply ships, and felt much more confident raiding the Snakeman base than I did against Ethereals. Toying with the Ethereals while I attempted to capture their boss would get the squad wiped out, I reasoned. Snakemen seemed a softer target.

 

Of course, then I remembered the Chryssalids.

 

Initial deployment went smoothly, my men fanning out in pairs, covering corners, while my plasma-hovertank scouted forward, marking targets for my Blaster-Bomb team. Before taking down a target I would have my psi-team check their identity. While currently unable to commit direct psi-attacks, they could at least use Mind Probes.

 

A trio of snake men were tagged cleanly within the first couple of turns, and my scouts had located the Command Centre and a pair of supply rooms. As I became frustrated constantly finding "leaders" and not "commanders", I forgot to move up my 2nd fireteam into better cover. A Chryssalid bounded around the corner and got within inches of Captain Ellsworthy before being blasted in the face. His friend was tagged coming out of the caverns.

 

In the confusion, I took my attention away from my tank, which was scouting the other end of the base, unsupported. It was promptly shredded by a pair of Chryssalids , leaving my right flank wide open.

 

While the Squad XO, Captain Mueller, checked the Command Centre for the boss-snake (nearly being fragged by a snakeman who'd rather detonate the command consoles, and himself, than be taken by a human) the aforementioned pair of Chysallids rushed the team I had stationed in the caverns outside the Command Centre. While they were able to keep the bugs supressed enough to avoid zombification, the team was pinned, and Mueller left hanging.

 

Upon attempting to sneak out under supressive fire, he was snared by a Chryssalid, and his zombified form mauled his wingman to death.

 

Then the supporting squad, attempting to retreat, was flanked and gunned down by who later turned out to be my mark, the Commander. While my psi-team was left trying to hold back the rush, my remaining 2 men (Revenu and Mosovich) were rushed from the recently cleared storerooms to provid reinforcement.

 

My psi-team were split up to cover the caverns, while Mosovich and Revenu (the only man still with a Stun Launcher) were sent to sneak up behing the Commander, who was running from my Psi's, taking pot shots and using my zombified men as a meat-shield.

 

Overwhelmed, the fireteam took down all but two zombies, but were quickly shredded despite the armour.

 

While Mosovich ate plasma en route, Revenu along made it to the command centre, and spent the next few turns trading fire with the Commander (KOing him twice) while fending off attacks from ex-teammates.

 

But against all odds, this man (the rookie of the squad) survived, alone and with scant few health points left. His last kill was reaction fire against a zombie/chryssalid which had popped around a corner literally inches away. He even got the Commander.

 

Damn, playing it was like watching the marines in Aliens getting ganked in the atmosphere processor, or extracting from Medical as the place gets swarmed. Good stuff. I need a drink.

[Bomb Bloke]

Note that if you KO an alien, if it gets up it's unable to retrieve its weapons. There's usually four aliens in the control center.

 

Chysallids are usually a walk in the park, but during base missions things are a little tricky - Because everything is in close quarters, and because they're so fast, killing them with reaction fire just doesn't work. You need to get them before they get you.

[Alpha_Monkey]

I dunno, reaction fire worked pretty well on my re-run.

 

I just went through the mission again, and had my men hold up at a couple of strategic choke points while I let the bugs come to me. Once their numbers had been thinned, I sent a two-man snatch squad to corner the Commander in the CC. Didn't lose a man. Not nearly as epic, mind you....

 

The Ethereal base, on the other hand.....I just nuked the everloving crap out of it with BBs....