The Quick and the Dead and the Stupid.

[Pete]

I gave up on tanks long ago playing SuperHuman. I lost them before they even got down the ramp on three consecutive missions, and rookies are just plain cheaper to replace.

 

You have to learn not to care too much about your men at the beginning of a superhuman campaign, so it's doubtless harder in this particular situation because they've been named.

 

And also because I'm dead!!!

[Bomb Bloke]

The damage done to crashed UFOs is random. In many cases (25% for anything with a single power source unit), there won't be any at all. Large scouts also have a dedicated engine room, meaning that even if the engine does blow, odds are it'll only take out one or two aliens for you.

[Crazy Photon]

You want beefy chaps with 40+ strength to get good results with the High Explosive. As for rockets - use the Large Rockets as they are anathema to Superhuman Cyberdiscs. Don't waste small or tank rockets on them - they just take too many.

 

Yes, that almost goes without saying, it'd be suicidal otherwise!

 

I also prefer using a tank, as they are good scouts/spotters (I use XCOMUTIL's improved tanks, though). I sometimes use a cannon tank instead of the rocket tank for the first terror mission, as they are a bit cheaper to replace and don't want to kill civilians by accident.

 

I lost them before they even got down the ramp on three consecutive missions, and rookies are just plain cheaper to replace.

 

Smoke grenades are your friends I usually drop 2 of them on turn 0, one on the ramp and one on the first level near the exit of the Skyranger. You still need to move the tank just a bit on the ramp though, which may kill it sometimes if the LZ is very hot. I immediately end my turn after that, so that the smoke screen is deployed, and it also has the advantage that any aliens around may have their TUs consumed when the troops begin to fan out.

[NKF]

If used right tanks are always handy disposable units, though their low reactions make them reaction fire magnets and their high cost is rather prohibitive in the early game. But as you play and get more cash, it gets easier and easier to own them. The laser tanks are cheap as free later in the game.

 

- NKF

[chiasaur11]

If used right tanks are always handy disposable units, though their low reactions make them reaction fire magnets and their high cost is rather prohibitive in the early game. But as you play and get more cash, it gets easier and easier to own them. The laser tanks are cheap as free later in the game.

 

- NKF

 

True.

 

AND if you don't need as many as you thought you would, you can flip them for a healthy profit.

 

Of course, I have my tank horror stories too, along with the successes. Willing to bet they're at least as bad as anyone else's worst.

[Space Voyager]

Please be careful, FA, I WANNA LIVE!!! No heavy plasma in the face, PLEASE!

[Thorondor]

Who are you talking to? He's already dead, remember?

 

::

 

And he wants company...

[Space Voyager]

[Sunflash]

Who are you talking to? He's already dead, remember?

 

::

 

And he wants company...

 

 

Yeah but we knew ZOMBIE, okay, talking to the undead doesn't scare most of us.

[ulairion]

Awesome. Can I join the squad? I always wanted to die a horrible death as soon as I step down the Skyranger. Morituri te salutant

[chiasaur11]

I was thinking Dulce et decorum est pro terra mori myself.

 

What the heck. Put me in coach.

[DragonHawk]

Gimme some experience here so I can climb the rank ladder.

[FullAuto]

Damn it, crashed. Try again tomorrow!

[Gimli]

Gimli sees it all, knelt by the ramp, and screams when he feels what's left of Zombie run down his face. "NO! NO! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

 

I got over it quickly. I never liked that guy anyway, always talking about brains.

 

Gimli charges after it, survives a plasma pistol blast to the face

 

Dwarven faces are made of alien alloys.

[Space Voyager]

Dwarven faces are made of alien alloys.

I thought that was mithril!

[NKF]

I thought that was mithril!

 

 

It's just a rose by another name. It's light. It's malleable. It's tough as anything. And vertically challenged folk as well as talk lanky anemic folk with long features and supernatural powers are involved in it - though that's where the tale starts to get a bit fuzzy.

 

Now, Skyranger plate is whole different story.

 

- NKF

[Grossbeer]

cool can i be a recruit too?

like the writing style, i rolled on the floor laughing quite often

 

greez

[Sgt. Strike]

If anyone wants to add me in, then fine, if not, it's cool too.

[Matri]

We could always do with more meat shields.

[Space Voyager]

FA, do tell... are things so bad you don't want us to know?

[Pete]

I reckon he lost the game in the first turn of the terror mission.

[Sunflash]

I reckon he lost the game in the first turn of the terror mission.

 

 

Impossible! I was still on Base Defense duty, and that means the base is well-protected!

[JellyfishGreen]

Hell, I always wanted ta' see Cape Town before I died. Any seats left on this Ruskie flyin' bus?

[FullAuto]

Right, after four crashes, here we go. You'll have to forgive the relative scarcity of screenies, by the fifth attempt I was very short on patience.

 

Twelve chaps, all armed to the teeth, plus some medikits. Arrived in the day, just. What could possibley go wrong? Whoops.

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The pilot has cleverly plonked us down in a roughly central location, so there could be enemies all around. Time to deploy a smoke grenade.

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"Looks more like a massive cloud of dandruff." Crazy Photon offers, peering out into the haze.

 

"You'd know." mutters chiasaur11, only for CP to promptly shove him out of the 'ranger.

 

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"Contact!" chaisaur11 kneels. "One purple floaty thing, one brown hairy thing, north-west of our position."

 

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CP leaps out and surveys the other side. "Ditto!"

 

"You can't 'ditto' a contact report. Yours are to the south-east for starters."

 

"I just ditto'd the first bit..."

 

Caught in a crossfire, the troops perform magnificently, firing and moving, throwing grenades and letting off bursts at any Floater brave enough to wobble into view. Ulairion moves up to the edge of the 'ranger and unleashes some HFD (Hot Fiery Death) on the closest Reaper.

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And the Skyranger. As fumes fill the plane, and the autumnal scent of burning plastic fills everyone's nostrils, they hurry out into the killing grounds.

 

They spread out quickly, using whatever sparse cover there is to hand, the railings of a fence, a lamp post, a hedge. JellyFishGreen is disgusted to find a Floater shrugging off two AP rounds from his autocannon, and two rifle rounds, and it bobbles off around a corner. As the troopers kill visible aliens and try to push out, more aliens move up.

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DragonHawk squints through the smoke at the enemy. "Is that a massive testicle, you think?"

 

"I wish I had a huge testicle instead of legs." Slaughter sighed.

 

Tragedy strikes as Azrael Strife fires a burst at an enemy chiasaur11 spotted. Chiasaur11, in cover behind a lamp post, takes a bullet to the back of the head and flops forward, lifeless.

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"It wasn't me..." Azrael Strife starts, before being interrupted by shouts and screams.

 

"I suppose his head just exploded on its own!" Matri suggests.

 

"I didn't do anything..." Az turns to the rest of the squad, eyes like pie plates. "I swear, I was just shooting and he just fell over."

 

MitsuMishi cradled chiasaur11's head gingerly. "Well, he didn't get the exit wound in the forehead from the pavement."

 

"Dude, you're spilling brains everywhere." Sunflash pointed out the pink gloop and MitsuMishi let the head hit the ground with a soggy thwack.

 

The aliens to the north-west retreat into cover from the heavy fire of rifles, pistols, and twin autocannons. The X-Commies take a chance, sprinting across the road, the disgraced Az leading the way, eager to absolve himself. They sweep the buildings there quickly, and Az comes face to face with a Floater.

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Two out of three rounds later, the Floater is flushed from life to death, and Az manages to stop sobbing in shame. The troops begin re-crossing back to the 'ranger to clear out the other side of the map.

 

Grenades are deployed when autocannon fire fails to find the Reapers, but Floaters are the main enemy, and their plasma fire that comes surging out of nowhere. MitsuMishi edges north/north-east as the alien fire slackens, and spots a Floater near the northern edge of the battlescape.

https://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h109/FullAuto_2006/X-Com/tm6.png

Both shoot, both miss, and next turn MM deploys a proxy at the end of the alley between the houses. "Float over that."

https://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h109/FullAuto_2006/X-Com/tm4.png

The Floater fails to understand the quip, and dies. MitsuMishi nods, giving the corpse a masculine smile. "Oldest trick in the book."

 

Kaije spots some civilians busy wandering the street aimlessly amidst the firefight. "Are you here to save us, or what?" Calls one.

 

"Are you people retarded?" Kaije, tempted to put warning shots through their knees, is distracted, and that's when things go wrong.

https://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h109/FullAuto_2006/X-Com/tm7.png

An alien grenade, a strange extraterrestrial potato of death, lands near the 'ranger, and the explosion engulfs a group of troops. DragonHawk, closest to the blast, is torn to shreds. JFG, busy reloading his autocannon, and NKF, stood over him, are both killed. To add insult to injury, MitsuMishi, on the periphery of the explosion, survived it, and was then shot. Harsh.

 

But the counter-attack is just as vicious, and the last few Floaters find themselves massively outgunned, with bullets cracking in from many different points. Ulairion, still wielding his autocannon, sets fire to things with gay abandon, and the Floaters flee from the patches of HFD scattered liberally around them. Pretty soon, the last Floater is exchanging shots with ulairion, its attention fully occupied, and Crazy Photon flanks it, and hole-punches it in 7.62mm.

https://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h109/FullAuto_2006/X-Com/tm3.png

Not a great victory, by any means, but some went home alive.

https://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h109/FullAuto_2006/X-Com/tmend.png

The two remaining civvies honoured the departing Skyranger with a golf clap. "Oh, well done." and survey what is left of their once-beautiful city.

[Pete]

The two remaining civvies honoured the departing Skyranger with a golf clap. "Oh, well done." and survey what is left of their once-beautiful city.

 

Priceless It so often ends that way.

 

Well done for not landing at night time - I fear you wouldn't have done quite as well if you had!