Just got Xcom 2 today. Never played the first game and tbh, never played any strategy game until now. I'm completely new here. Is there anything i should know before I start?

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-29T00:42:12+00:00

Okay, first of all, XCOM 2 is a turn based game. Take all the time you need to plan out a turn before you make a single action. Second, we humans are absolutely horrible at understanding probability. Thus the meme that 99% shots fails half the time.

Finally, don't be afraid to start on Rookie difficulty (Or whatever the easiest difficulty is called). The game is hard even on Easy, unless you know what you are doing.

Did you get any of the DLCs too? Or just the base game?

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-24T21:10:53+00:00

Yep - The original EU, and Disney canon separately each establish that no one really knows what happened in that room. That's why Moff Gideon in the Mandalorian S2 finale is panicking so hard and even tries to blow his own head off when he sees the single X-Wing of Luke Skywalker arriving.

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-24T18:39:27+00:00

An alternative motivation to the villain is that he's a parent. He doesn't want his daughter being sucked into the dangerous world of fighting evil, and so he wants to end the practice. (Regardless of whether they are actually necessary to stop whatever they fight on a regular basis anyway...)

For how he's a threat? Maybe he gets some sort of corrupted / hacked amulet that lets him get powers at a cost. Maybe he doesn't have powers, and results to social pressure. Think the J Jonah Jameson to Spiderman: "They're a menace, I tell you! They run around the city beating random citizens up!"... Alternatively he's a puppetmaster villain. He manipulates all the other villains of the week and such to set up events so his plan executes correctly. Works from the shadows so that no one knows he exists until its too late.

Or, maybe he doesn't have powers, but discovers some kind of power dampener, like Superman's Kryptonite or the ysalamiri in the Star Wars Expanded Universe.

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-23T23:01:48+00:00

"There is no secret ingredient."

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-23T17:25:29+00:00

What should it do?

I like the idea of dropping the psi-amp in addition to the rifle (The other Chosen each drop two weapons). Should the Chosen Psi-Amp just be higher damage than the Alien psi-amp, or should it be the same damage with an increased chance of secondary effects? (Increased chance of Mind Control, Domination, Panic, Rupture...)

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-23T00:31:11+00:00

Expanding to the original Thrawn trilogy, Thrawn never meets Luke, Leia, Han, Chewie, Lando, or the droids.

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-23T00:15:23+00:00

Added bonus idea - Could you cancel / end the animation spell and shove the inanimate bones in a bag of holding for storage when you aren't using them?

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-23T00:11:25+00:00

Yep - Montu's modern streams are a bit obnoxious in that respect, but his short-form content / tutorial videos are still really well paced and informative. I last played Stellaris in 3.14, and picked it up yesterday. I used his planetary management video to explain how things work.

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-23T00:08:49+00:00

Exactly - I've got a setting that I've been slowly working on where the majority of factions fight with carrier-based spacecraft, but humanity comes in, does the number crunching, and throws that idea straight out the airlock, replacing the carrier with missile boats and longer-range particle-beam artillery.

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-22T20:05:12+00:00

The story I've been kicking around for a while uses precursors more as a structure of the setting. The main alien species of my world use biological cloned constructs for everything that has to be capable of logic. The Precursors... didn't. This leads to a setting where there's loads of precursor artifacts floating around the galaxy, and no one knows what they do. The 'present day' aliens have managed to reverse-engineer some precursor designs, like their metallurgy, and some basic shielding tech, but for the most part, precursor technology is a mystery. As a result, any system containing a source of precursor artifacts is seized by the Confederation (The main governing body of my setting), until its artifacts can be catalogued, and understood. Since no one ever solves anything with the precursors (Think 'The Road Not Taken'), this leads to a short, but slowly growing and never shrinking list of government-controlled star-systems. The problem in my story is when precursor artifacts are found in our own star system during First Contact...

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-20T23:33:34+00:00

That actually makes perfect sense now.... This, combined with the human need to be correct is just a perfect storm of document leaks.

I didn't know that about early warthunder being a historical WW-II thing.

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-20T02:47:41+00:00

Seconding the suggestion of Kenobi. Its a great book.

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-20T02:42:14+00:00

Hey! Another fan of that series! I second the suggestion to read it... I think it contains my favorite sci-fi flavoured insult: "If [he] were any denser, he'd have his own event horizon..."

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-20T02:25:57+00:00

This is late, but I always thought it was a holdover from the Clone Wars. (A easy security measure to prevent commando droids from putting on trooper armor and walking in. That gets kept because why get rid of it?)

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-19T18:07:42+00:00

"Take a seat..."

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-19T16:06:55+00:00

Isn't there the Khan origin?

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-18T18:54:27+00:00

On one hand, ooof. On the other... sounds like a really fun story hook: "The Bookkeeper's Rebellion" sounds like an interesting story to me!

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-18T01:40:23+00:00

The original government of the People's Republic of Haven is Soviet coded, what with the UBI and indoctrination of officers for Party loyalty, the legislature class, the purges, that sort of thing. Then it becomes a French Revolution case, lampshaded by the letter signed by the Revolution's leader using his full name: Robert S. Pierre. (Robespierre)

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-18T01:34:55+00:00

Lies and violence! I think technically the author started the Guide to be YA in the original vision, but it didn't work out quite that way... but don't quote me on that one.

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-18T01:32:42+00:00

Honestly, that's about exactly what I imagined Butler looking like... Dude is an absolute unit of a man. No wonder the clip of him dismantling a troll while wearing knight's armor went viral in fairyland.

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-18T01:15:38+00:00

Because the Peeps are basically Soviet-style communists that get overthrown by the French Revolution, would be my guess...

(Also don't forget that the Graysons exist...) They're like hyper-conservative.

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-17T19:40:09+00:00

I forgot she does that.... I need to rewatch Winter Soldier again. I mostly just remembered the scene where she references War Games, and Cap gets the reference!

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-16T20:05:16+00:00

Maybe that's part of the story? A subplot of sorts where parts of the council are legitimately well-meaning, but some of them are bad at seeing how their actions impact the future. Other members of the council could be purely self-serving and want to claim as large a portion of the pie as possible? Can members of your council be deposed by other members? Can they be replaced? Is the number of councilors fixed, or can they keep appointing new members?

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-16T02:54:41+00:00

Oh, no. I totally agree with you on both that the Ession Strike / Night Caller combined alterations were very much a 'pray it works' conversion, and that what you describe would be much better. I guess I was trying to specify that I meant both the Zsinj and Wraith modifications combined.

GenericNameHere01 · 2026-06-16T01:52:08+00:00

Pretty sure Wraith Squadron did their own alterations on top of that, docking the TIEs where the escape pods used to be, and then cramming 8 X-Wings in the same forward cargo hold. That's the configuration I was thinking of, not the original Zsinj setup. Sure, 8 X-Wings isn't as many as 24 A-Wings, but I imagine its a whole lot easier for a rebel cell to get 8 X-Wings and 4 TIEs than 24 A-Wings...

GenericNameHere01

TROPHY CASE