Who has fought the Long War? (XCOM)

[ZZoMBiE13]

I'm a pretty big fan of XCOM: Enemy Unknown and it's expansion Enemy Within. According to Steam, I've logged nearly 600 hours playing it since I bought it (at launch).

I'm not really the type of person who usually goes in for modding too much unless it's on the Steam Workshop. I know mods are great, but early in my PC days I downloaded a pretty nasty virus with a mod and after having to work so hard to correct my mistake, I considered it "lesson learned" and have typically avoided them. Even though we have much better scanning tools now than when this happened in the 90s, I'm still always wary, even if it looks legit. But that's really not what I want this thread to be about.

What I was hoping to discus was folks who have played the Long War mod, is it as fun as it looks? Any tales you'd like to share with someone who's considering (but not sold) on giving it a try? And further, while it looks like it adds a ton of fun new options is there any advice you'd like to offer? Any tips, tricks, or things to watch out for? Or do you just have fun stories from a hard fought battle that you'd like to share? I'd love to hear them.

Also, lastly, is it pretty easy to install? I haven't done a non-Workshop mod since I started using Steam a few years back. While there was a time when I was quite savvy to the inner workings of Windows and PCs in general, I've fallen off in the last decade and have kinda lost the knack without detailed instruction. Am I better off not bothering, or is it pretty simple to get up and running? I could ask on the NEXUS, but those folks are so far beyond my level I feel a little intimidated, especially given that I used to be a PC guy. Feel a little stripe of shame running down my back on that one, but that is neither here nor there.

Looking forward to hearing what people who've played it think of this.

 

[tippy2k2]

I have not. I know soldiers who have fought in that bloody war [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.864206-XCOM-Long-War] but I have not personally.

I love XCOM. Like....a lot. I don't replay games and I've never replayed a game all the way through. I have played XCOM four different times (granted, only one of those ended in victory but the others ended due to a lot of death [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/groups/view/Tippy2k2-s-XCOM-Army-Let-s-Play] rather than me getting bored).

Honestly...if I had a PC rather than console, I'd have downloaded it already based on everything I hear about it. In fact, once I find a copy of the game on the PC for cheaper (Here's hoping the Steam Sale comes through for me), I plan on buying it just to play The Long War. I don't even know if my computer can handle XCOM but that's a risk I'm willing to take with how much I love this game.

So...a big "thumbs up" from a guy who's never played it if that's any use

 

[Rack]

I've just installed relatively recently it so I can't really offer any advice other than the install is pretty straightforward, just download it and run the executable it appears to handle all the funkiness of xcom modding (back in the day Xcom was a pain in the ass to mod) automatically. I'd recommend throwing in a fast forward key (there's pretty clear instructions to this here http://wiki.tesnexus.com/index.php/How_to_DIY_common_mod_solutions_-_XCOM:EU_2012) or watching the animations over and over can get a bit much over such a long game.

 

[stringtheory]

I recently installed it. On my first mission out of six troopers sent in two came back injured. The battles require you to have flanking or otherwise no cover for the target, otherwise you're not hitting shit. Other than that I haven't gotten much farther so I can't say about other differences
Installing was easy enough, just select the game install folder and the installer does the rest.

 

[SirBob42]

I only got about ten hours into my Long War campaign, but that was only because I got distracted by other games. The mod is quite good. It has makes some interesting changes on both the strategic and tactical levels. It will probably force you to change your gameplay patterns. It will definitely make for a longer campaign.

As for installing, that was pretty straightforward. It came with an installer, if memory serves, and one just had to run it.

 

[elvor0]

Easy as pie to install. Run the exe and you're golden. If you want to uninstall just run the game verification through steam.

Frankly, it's excellent. I couldn't imagine playing XCOM without it. It adds lots of new guns that aren't just linear upgrades and actually change your strategy when using them. Most of the secondary items are all really useful (except perhaps battle trophies, they help prevent panic but ehhh, panic is managed better in Long War anyway).

The Inteceptors have more to them, EXP, attack modes, etc etc. They're not very good at the start, but that makes sense, human jet, shouldn't be able to just wipe out an alien space ship with 2 crappy unadvanced missiles.

It's harder, but harder in a fairer way. The enemies AI gets better as difficulty increases, they don't just get hax. Aliens can attack you more than 5 at a time now, so you have to be careful. Plus elite aliens are a thing. That means the potential for Chrysalids with Lightning Reflexes. (Granted it's not /as/ powerful in Long War but christ did I shit myself when one charged at me and proced it)

New classes are fun and well balanced.

The one thing I /don't/ like is the battle fatigue, in that if you send a soldier out on two missions in a row, he gets resigned to recovery and you can't take him/her out again till he's recovered. I get why they did it as it forces you to keep a standing army in order to better fit the theme of the game, but it removes the personal ties you can develop with your soldiers when I'm cycling through 100 men.

 

[Ihateregistering1]

There's a lot of mixed feelings about Long War, but as a huge X-Com fan, I have to say...didn't like it.

This was hugely disappointing to me, because some of the ideas it had were just superb, like the ability to take back countries that had pulled out of the council, or items having different weights that affected movement, or the new "commissioned Officer" class, but it had too many annoying issues that I just couldn't get over.

-Interceptor repair is just absurdly slow. It can often take nearly a month for Interceptors to be repaired, which wouldn't even be believable in the real world. This is exacerbated because Interceptors are much weaker in LW than in regular X-Com. It's not uncommon for you to have to send 4 Interceptors to take out a single small UFO.

-Research is also absurdly slow. This wouldn't be an issue except that the enemy seems to advance just as fast as they do in vanilla X-Com, so before you know it you're fighting Floaters and Chrysallids with regular weapons and armor.

-The new character classes are a great idea, but the execution felt very poor to me. The new classes are basically just combinations of the old classes, but some of the combinations make no sense. For example, the Scout is a combination of the Sniper and Assault class, two polar opposite classes with abilities that don't really compliment each other.

-The battle fatigue is a good idea, but too dang slow. I always like to imagine that the Soldiers recruited to fight for X-Com are supposed to be the best of the best that the countries have to offer, so the idea that a Soldier who didn't suffer any wounds needs to rest for 6 days felt sort of insane.

-This isn't necessarily a bad thing but it is REALLY hard to get used to, but part of the idea of LW is that there are fights that you're not supposed to be able to win, and you're supposed to run away from. The problem is that you sometimes won't realize you're supposed to run until your guys are well into the level, and you'll turn the corner and run into 5 Chrysallids and just get massacred.

I really wanted to like LW because it had so many good ideas, but ultimately I just found it too frustrating to really enjoy.

 

[Rattja]

Yes I have, It's basically just better in every way. Takes some time getting used to the longer firefights and the large squad roster you need to keep, but it is really an improvement I think as you have a lot of tactical freedom with all the new classes and weapons.

It's a bit hard to explain all that makes it better, I mean it is still the same game at it's core, you just have to me much MUCH more careful about everything you do, but you have more options.

The aliens are actually scary in Long war, you can't just rush in and kill things in 1 turn anymore.
Full cover is your best friend, never ever assume you are in the clear, overwatch like a madman and do not get greedy.
I can't stress enough how quickly things can go to hell, always expect the worst.

Just to give you an idea of what you may encounter even on classic:

Spoiler: After killing two guys and a SHIV, the Mechtoid blew a hole in the wall revealing 6 Outsiders and 4 Chryssalids

All I wanted was some alloys...

Other than that it's the same story and all that, so that won't change.

As for installment, it's fairly simple. Just google Long War, go to the first thing that pops up (nexus), make an account if you dont have one (it's free) and then download. Follow the instructions from the nexus site and you should have it running in no time.
If you liked the other XCOM games then I am quite sure you will love this one.

Sadly there is no multiplayer in Long War, so if you want to do that you would have to uninstall the mod.

 

[MJpoland]

At first, before the Enemy within expansion the mod was moderately hard to install (instalation included for example going offline on steam and blocking the game ability to contact the server - recall option or something like that), but now its very easy to install, just download the exe and start it, nothing more.

I played the Long War 2 times and now I'm on mine 3th playthrough, this time on classic difficulty. As for the mod itself, its incredibly fun to play, but there are downsides as well. In some aspects the game makes some things unnecessarily difficult - back in my 2nd campaign (beta 7 upgraded later to 9) I discovered that you need to rank up your psi soldier to level 4 before you can go to temple ship... and since I didn't rush the psis before that I had to play over 50 extra missions only to grind psi xp for my soldiers. When game forces you to grind xp in order to progress, its never good. This time I'm starting my psi program much earlier to avoid that, but I'm still little mad that the game didn't warn you at all about this beforehand (even if it kinda makes sense that the candidate should be a very powerful psi to fulfill his task - much more logical than having to slap a specific armor on a random psi soldier in vanilla)

I still hope that the mod (currently on beta 14f) will continue to develop and add more and more stuff into the game. Lately they even started on looking for voice actors for the mod (finally some accents for the soldiers). Who knows what will be added next.

 

[ZZoMBiE13]

Yes I have, It's basically just better in every way. Takes some time getting used to the longer firefights and the large squad roster you need to keep, but it is really an improvement I think as you have a lot of tactical freedom with all the new classes and weapons.

You know, I always kept a pretty deep roster anyway. My first run through the vanilla Enemy Unknown was pretty rough. I was one country away from losing, more than once I lost a highly advanced soldier due to a poor choice I had made, it was tough (but wonderful).

That said, it made me start playing with a pretty fleshed out roster of soldiers from the second game on. Through my attempts to play the tougher difficulties, through Enemy Within, I always tried to keep at least 4 full squads and some alternates for when they were hurt. And once you get to the PSI chapter, I liked to have at least one full Psi-squad (although you're at the mercy of the game on that one).

Once, I had a great team concept going. One team was named after the Red Dwarf crew (Kryten, Cat, Lister, Rimmer, Kochanski, and ACE) and they all wore red armor; one team was named after the X-Men (Bobby Drake, Kitty Pryde, Jean Grey, Scott Summers, Hank McCoy and a SHIV I called XAVIER) and they all wore yellow/blue armor; one team was based on wrestlers I used to like (Mostly the nWo and one for Bret Hart) in black and white armor(except Bret Hart, obviously); and lastly a team based on some of my gamer friends. It was a fun playthrough.

I started watching a Let's Play of the Long War mod. It's giving me a good idea of what I'd have to look forward to. Thanks for the reponses! It's always nice to hear from folks on the Escapist.

 

[ZZoMBiE13]

The new classes are basically just combinations of the old classes, but some of the combinations make no sense. For example, the Scout is a combination of the Sniper and Assault class, two polar opposite classes with abilities that don't really compliment each other.

I can see why they'd try to combine the two to fill a niche. Obviously I don't know much about the mechanics of how it plays out since I haven't used the mod. But I do get that class concept.

When I played Enemy Within, I started taking 2 snipers with me. One was what we typically think of as an XCOM sniper; Squad Sight, Double Tap, Opportunist, etc. The other one though (I called him my "Action Sniper") I kept this soldier way closer to the battle. While the regular sniper would be held back in relative safety, usually with a height advantage, my "Action Sniper" had the perk that allowed a sniper to move and still shoot so he could run in and take a sort of emergency shot. He often saved the day for me.

All the other stuff you mentioned is a little terrifying. But in that way that makes you curious.

 

[Ihateregistering1]

SNIP

I'd still recommend giving it a shot, and it's very easy to uninstall if you don't like it.

The biggest problem for me was the insanely slow repairs to interceptors and the way too long battle fatigue. It's also tough to wrap your head around the fact that you often are put in situations where you can't win, and you just have to accept it.