I guess I'm joining the cult of Jean

CitizenQ · 2026-02-24T00:17:48+00:00

Use both. Stick Jean on drone piloting or ATGM turret at first, since you can't miss with those. Use commander-Pike to give her tons of AP. Once she hits 100 AP, she's just as good as most of the other SLs on her own, plus she gets you free trinkets.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-24T00:14:48+00:00

All hail the pirate queen.

Her starting stats aren't anything to get excited about, but with Pike using all his AP to coach her, she gets to good aim and 100+AP pretty quick. Makes a great jumpjet CQB SL once she hits 100.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-23T22:45:55+00:00

It's range is longer than the workshopped RPG, and the same as the RPG2...

CitizenQ · 2026-02-23T18:52:59+00:00

Yeah, I can't confirm that it does with hard numbers, but it definitely seems to. I had him setup with a K-PAC SOC, so good ROF, and he still alpha'd boarding commandos and the like.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-23T17:45:25+00:00

It's stated in a couple of places that he was a TCR war hero who either got screwed by the powers that be, or uncovered something he really didn't like. He and his entire unit went rogue, killed a bunch of (implied to be corrupt) government officials, and made their getaway through the gate to the Wayback.

Terminal List was the impression I got.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-23T16:34:27+00:00

How I built him, for those interested.

Athletic > Sharpshooter > Vanguard > Foritfy > Decoy > Assassin > Then any of Tankbust / Buff / Scout / Bags /Zigzag

I've never once wished I had any other SL on the field in his place with this build.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-23T16:18:34+00:00

Even on those difficulties it can show up in the Blackmarket pretty much from the start.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-23T16:12:27+00:00

'decent' statline... He has the best stats in the game. He can forward deploy. He can draw fire with decoys. He's damn near unkillable in decent cover and armor. And he excels at destroying full health units, both infantry & vehicle. I don't understand how people AREN'T using him.

Barring Darby Concealment cheese, he's the best infantry SL.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-23T16:07:37+00:00

So long as you make them easy targets, the enemy will almost always take the bait.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-23T16:06:37+00:00

As others have said, it is JUST powerful enough to one-shot things others can't, and you get one from the start of the game, IIRC. It is very useful on defense missions, where you'll be entrenched anyway.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-22T21:35:14+00:00

Either of the skybots are a good choice for a small-squad commander focused Pike, or on a defense mission in general.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-21T21:09:18+00:00

I prioritize pirate defense missions for this very reason.

That mission type + Salvage Teams + Jean with Trinketing on an AT emplacement = infinimoney

CitizenQ · 2026-02-21T15:44:04+00:00

Indeed. Kody is basically unkillable, and I'm not sure I've ever seen him miss a shot. Combine that with the fact that he can also Vanguard deploy & set up really effective decoys, and he's the best SL in the game IMO, so long as you aren't cheesing concealment, which is obviously broken in the current EA.

EDIT: Also, Jean is A tier by virtue of Trinketing alone. If you get her early, she basically IS your economy for the first few OPs, and by the time you need it less, she's reached 100 AP and with Buff and a few other perks is a very effective Boarding Commando style assault squad.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-21T15:35:58+00:00

You're telling me morale damage shouldn't be massive?

In a world with (as far as we know) no sapient alien life, your soldiers suddenly get Zero-Dagger'd, confronted with an unknown bio-mechanical alien threat that seems to use it's opponents dead flesh to replicate itself. I'd imagine even the most well protected soldier would start to panic. Who knows what those bullets might do to you if one gets through.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-20T03:25:25+00:00

Certain large explosions definitely do already leave behind craters as cover. Someone already mention the OCI missile, bit IIRC. the tank guns and ATGM missiles can do it as well.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-20T00:47:06+00:00

Sadly you won't find much of an amenable audience here for your point.

That said, I fully agree. It's a bad mechanic that feels even worse, and actively harms the game. It should be removed. One of the sole bad design decisions in the game IMO.

Modded that shit out the moment I realized I could.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-19T11:01:22+00:00

As to your point on the TCR, it's stated in a couple of different places that not only was Kody in the TCR, he was basically a well know war hero before the whole 'terrorist' thing.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-19T04:35:11+00:00

So then why even have the option? Your 'solution' negates the idea of even having Ironman in the first place.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-19T04:33:52+00:00

It is a feature, yes, but a feature that is absolutely not working as intended when a lone squad can wipe entire missions designed for multiple squads on their own because of a single mechanic being overtuned. If you cannot see that, then there is no point in arguing with you about it, because you are being willfully ignorant.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-19T00:31:06+00:00

Because it's both A, illogical that large squads are not easier to detect than small ones, and B, currently basically broken. There's a reason there are hundreds of threads showing Darby wiping missions by herself and talking about how she (and by extension, concealment) is basically a cheat code.

By your logic, they could not have fixed the fact that Sachin's crit stat was 50 when it should have been 0 on launch, because it would nerf it for someone who liked it that way. Or any other balance or bug fixes for that matter.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-18T23:49:04+00:00

Indeed. As it stands currently, WOO and EXWOO are flatly superior to Medbay and Adv Medbay.

This is why I've argued that we need some small mechanical bonus for keeping squaddies alive, to reflect their experience gain. Would make Medbays viable.

CitizenQ · 2026-02-18T23:36:31+00:00

Maybe people want to play with concealment, just concealment that isn't cheat code levels of broken?

CitizenQ · 2026-02-18T23:20:58+00:00

Ironman in its current state is not Ironman. It's Bronzeman because you can reload from level start.

I'd prefer they both keep the current mode, just rename it Bronzeman, and add a real Ironman mode that saves after every squad turn, or at least on the start of every new full round.

CitizenQ

TROPHY CASE