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XCOM 2: War of the Chosen |OT| Mario + Rabbids + Autopsies

Profanity

Member
Is the intro different? Did not play the base game so I have no fucking idea what's going on... also what happened in the first game canon wise? I kinda know but the game does not tell me anything, haha.

Canon-wise, you lost the EU/EW campaign after a few weeks of fighting, and the Elders kept you in stasis for twenty years to run simulations in order to refine and perfect their strategy and tactics. Essentially every 'won' game of EU/EW was a simulation. Now the resistance are finally breaking you out.
 
Canon-wise, you lost the EU/EW campaign after a few weeks of fighting, and the Elders kept you in stasis for twenty years to run simulations in order to refine and perfect their strategy and tactics. Essentially every 'won' game of EU/EW was a simulation. Now the resistance are finally breaking you out.
Well, if you take the original version of the final mission at face value,
you do beat the aliens in an alternate universe, at least if you go by the Uber Ethereal's dialogue.
 

Sarek

Member
I guess I hadn't played this in a long while since it took me 4-5 missions of vanilla XCOM2 to realize I actually needed to choose WoTC from the launcher to play it...
 
Anymore performance impressions?

Is it running better than vanilla 2 ran? About the same?
Much better. Like, much. I'm kind of stunned.

Load times are a fraction of what they were for vanilla. Framerate is still a little erratic, but I don't get the single digits on map load that I used to, and there are fewer hitches for destruction/explosions/fire.

The only place that isn't routinely hitting 60fps on nearly-max setting at 1440p is the squad loadout/edit screen, which was always a bugbear.

It also doesn't do that thing it used to where I temporarily got a black screen with little patches of green lighting whenever I returned to the Avenger.
 

killroy87

Member
Good news guys, I have a question that's probably been asked already!

I was reading the Kotaku review, and they mentioned that if you're playing XCOM 2 for the first time, it wouldn't be a bad idea to just go straight into War of the Chosen. Is that true?
 

TimeKillr

Member
Ugh, so yeah I still get constant crashes. And not just "normal" crashes too, just huge hardlocks that require me to reboot my PC.

I really don't know what the hell the problem is :(
 
Ugh, so yeah I still get constant crashes. And not just "normal" crashes too, just huge hardlocks that require me to reboot my PC.

I really don't know what the hell the problem is :(

Yep. The crashes are insane. I'm getting blue screens like crazy. It's unplayable. Only game that's ever done this.
 

jtb

Banned
Much better. Like, much. I'm kind of stunned.

Load times are a fraction of what they were for vanilla. Framerate is still a little erratic, but I don't get the single digits on map load that I used to, and there are fewer hitches for destruction/explosions/fire.

The only place that isn't routinely hitting 60fps on nearly-max setting at 1440p is the squad loadout/edit screen, which was always a bugbear.

It also doesn't do that thing it used to where I temporarily got a black screen with little patches of green lighting whenever I returned to the Avenger.

Mission load times are about 1/8 of what they used to be. Crazy

Music to my ears... maybe I'll pick this up before it goes on sale after all
 

Zojirushi

Member
Damn all this XCOM 2 and Mario+Rabbits talk got me thinking about maybe getting back into XCOM EW, dropped that for no good reason kinda early on.
 
Anymore performance impressions?

Is it running better than vanilla 2 ran? About the same?

It is now actually playable on a GTX 460 with 1GB, I'm somewhat surprised to say.

However, the way that accomplished is a bit.. eh.

What it seems like to me is that even the more basic particle effects that were still on in the vanilla game are turned off on lowest settings, and some other effects on the render seem to be disabled too. Visually however, you wouldn't really spot those unless you were looking for them. And obviously: lowest settings, lol.

The other big change is that ship animations are mildly simplified from the looks of it, in particular the biggest strain in framerate: the skyranger animations.
They were previously a slideshow for me, but that's the price you pay for people like me having seven year old systems.

I'll go check if the same changes exist in the vanilla version too, or whether they're ignored regardless of whether WotC is present.

edit: seems some of them are there, particularly explosions and physics effects no longer have such a big effect on performance, but there does appear to be a load time difference between vanilla and the DLC, with WotC being way faster on that end.
At any rate, any 'gaming system' from the last five years should find this playable well now.
 
I am loving these faction VOs--there's like five or six Star Trek actors in the mix.

Can you spot them all?
Damn all this XCOM 2 and Mario+Rabbits talk got me thinking about maybe getting back into XCOM EW, dropped that for no good reason kinda early on.

EW is still a great time. If you've played XCOM 2 you'll miss the improvements, but it plays differently, such that it doesn't feel like you're just doing the same thing over again.
 

Vengal

Member
This breaking most my mods is a pretty big bummer. It was outright crashing until I turned them all off. I wanted to try one at a time to see if any of the pure content mods made it through but it just wasn't worth the effort. Did the first mission and looked around then turned it off for now.

It runs alot better then vanilla though like almost night and day.
 
Hope the Alternate Mod Launcher gets an update soon. The vanilla launcher is fucking awful. Takes ages to load, no sorting, no renaming, lack of extra features, etc.
 

Ri'Orius

Member
So, uh, what happens if one of your hero units dies? Is there a way to get a replacement of that class later down the line?

Hypothetically speaking, of course.
 
I started a new game with the tutorial on because I heard the tutorial was new-ish, but I didn't get the option to turn on Ironman. I'm doing a self-enforced Ironman for now, but that seems ... odd?
 
Good news guys, I have a question that's probably been asked already!

I was reading the Kotaku review, and they mentioned that if you're playing XCOM 2 for the first time, it wouldn't be a bad idea to just go straight into War of the Chosen. Is that true?
No. Play at least one campaign of vanilla to learn how the game works, then jump into WOTC.
So how do I export propaganda posters without taking a screen of the game?
Go to Documents/My Games/XCOM 2 WOTC/. There's a Photo Booth folder there that holds all your posters.
 

iiicon

Member
Go to Documents/My Games/XCOM 2 WOTC/. There's a Photo Booth folder there that holds all your posters.

Yep, just found it before I read this. Thanks though!

5NmMiEA.png

What an awesome feature.
 

Stoze

Member
Hope the Alternate Mod Launcher gets an update soon. The vanilla launcher is fucking awful. Takes ages to load, no sorting, no renaming, lack of extra features, etc.
Alternate mod launcher is so damn good. By the way, on the subreddit there's a master list of WotC compatible popular mods. Some of my favorite ones I use in vanilla are working:

Cost-Based Ability Colors
Free Camera Rotation
Yet Another F1
RoboJumper's Squad Select
 
I loaded a save from near the end of the vanilla game, and I was shocked at how many options I had forgotten. WotC adds even more.

The sudden addition of a ruler into an ongoing game was weird though.

Maybe I should replay vanilla before going into WotC myself as well. :\
 

dadjumper

Member
I just finished XCOM: EW the other day and saw that this expansion was coming out on my birthday so I decided to grab it and the base game on a flash sale. This game is so good! I really like all the new additions and how snappy it feels compared to the first game
 

Clunker

Member
I'm assuming this has (non-steam) controller support, just like what was added in September?

Was totally planning to play with my elite controller and realized with it not being in at launch, i probably shouldn't assume it's in at launch here either...
Yes, controller support is in! I had a mini-freak out for about 5 minutes before realizing I had to re-enable controller support in Options.

I've only put an hour or two in, just getting to the Reapers and Skirmishers units, but boy, it definitely feels like it has more personality now with named units and traits. I can see myself starting to totally Fire Emblem it up with character pairings and managing relationship syncups, too! Sign my ass up for another 60 hours.
 

Sober

Member
I havent bought this but I will probably get it soon.

Also on PC the demo is still there for the poster maker, right? If so that means anyone can be part of GAF-COM. Are we still doing that?
 

Jintor

Member
I havent bought this but I will probably get it soon.

Also on PC the demo is still there for the poster maker, right? If so that means anyone can be part of GAF-COM. Are we still doing that?

We are but I don't have the logistical chops or understanding of the char pool to use it.

Could you set it up?
 

FlyinJ

Douchebag. Yes, me.
The expansion performs so much better than the base game. Load times are much faster, and hitching is gone.

Did they patch the base game without expansion to perform as well?
 

Sblargh

Banned
The expansion performs so much better than the base game. Load times are much faster, and hitching is gone.

Did they patch the base game without expansion to perform as well?

They didn't, which they are taking some justified flak for, but they said it is because they essentialy rebuilt big portions of the game for the expansion.
-
Well, time for legend ironman campaign 2: I hope things don't spiral tragically out of control this time!
 
What's the difference between 'DLC integrated' and selecting the missions "the nest" and a specific Shen DLC mission separately?

Because I figured not selecting those would disable those DLC's for my first campaign, but if 'integrated' means they're already active, what's the difference?
 

Sblargh

Banned
What's the difference between 'DLC integrated' and selecting the missions "the nest" and a specific Shen DLC mission separately?

Because I figured not selecting those would disable those DLC's for my first campaign, but if 'integrated' means they're already active, what's the difference?

Integrated you don't have the story missions, rulers appear at facilities and your first spark cost money.

Not Integrated and unchecked means no story missions, but rulers start appearing randomly and your first spark project at the proving ground is free.

Not Integrated and checked means the story missions.

They recommend not doing the story missions because three long early game missions doesn't blend well with the fatigue system.
 

KPJZKC

Member
So they fixed the mission loading times, huh? They're about 1/20 of what they were in base XCOM 2.

Which makes the base game all the more frustrating. How the hell did they manage to make it load so slowly? Even playing LW2 is a very frustrating experience with extended loading times.
 

Steel

Banned
I've got so many god damned custom characters that rely on all the mods I've downloaded that I can't start the game. I was kinda hoping that cosmetic mods wouldn't be effected, but...
 

Sblargh

Banned
Resistance haven mission.

Warlock chosen there.
Warlock mind control my reaper. Resistance kills my reaper.
Warlock mind control my ranger. Resistance kills my ranger.

Rage quit.
 
Bout to pick it up, didn't realize it but I had all the DLC, hadn't played in a while. I should keep Shens gift and Alien Hunters on right?
 
Start a new campaign on Legend since I already beat vanilla on legend twice, ace gatecrasher but get destroyed on the second mission, say to myself "just play on commander and figure out what's this all new stuff about then do a legend run after" get rolled over on the second mission anyway.

Yup it's xcom.
 
Bout to pick it up, didn't realize it but I had all the DLC, hadn't played in a while. I should keep Shens gift and Alien Hunters on right?
Yes. When you play WotC you can get rid of them if you want but if you keep them you no longer have to do the missions and the weapons that you find you develop and make instead. The Alien Hunters are still there but they don't attack every move now and you're warned when one appears. In my case at an Alien Facility. Basically they've been streamlined and incorporated into the WotC game.
 

FUME5

Member
Here's a list of cosmetic mods that may and may not work. They've all been tested in the Propaganda Center demo, which is as close as we can get to WOTC right now.

More or less fully functional:
  • Military Camouflage Patterns
  • More eye colors
  • More armor colors
  • HistoricalCamoPack
  • Mass Effect Armor & Camo Pack
  • New Countries
  • Custom Face Paints
  • Lipstick Pack (Facepaint)
  • Stargate Glyphs
  • More hair colors
  • Symmetrical Kevlar Arms!
  • Valkyria Chronicles Country Pack
  • MGS 4 Frog Trooper Outfit
  • Anarchys Children Extra Options
  • SliWhists SPARK Pack
  • Adam Jensen's Glasses
  • Stenchfury Modular Armors
Tested by tiagobmiranda:
  • Destroyer's Female Hair Pack
  • Destroyer's Female Hair Pack 2.0
  • Lara Croft Squadmate
  • Hotline Miami Masks Pack [W.I.P]
  • Invisible Heads
  • XCOM EU/EW Ports: Tier 1 Armour
Barely functional:
  • Eyepatch Right (no texture)
  • [Customisation Set] Im Too Fancy For Thouse Ayys (some textures/materials might not be working right)
  • XCOM EU/EW Ports: Helmets (textures don't load and can cause crashing)
  • WA'sCustomGear (texture errors)
  • Halo ODST Armour (no textures)
  • XCOM EU/EW Ports: Extras (no texture, causes lag)
  • Halo Reach Marines Pack (texture errors on helmets, not textures on everything else)
  • EW MEC Ports (no textures, slight lag)
  • ME3 Tali Squadmate (no textures besides face plate)
  • ME3 Kasumi Squadmate (some textures load, others don't)
  • ME 3 Cat-6 Mercenaries Pack (no textures)
  • CX Praetor Armor (Doomguy / Chick 2016) (leg & 1 helmet textures work, error on transparent face plate, no textures on arms and chest)
  • Warden Gear (no textures and/or texture errors)
  • ADVENT MEC For SPARK (no textures)
  • XCom EW helmets for SPARK's (texture errors and/or no textures)
  • Spart's SPARKBashes (some textures work, others turn neon, some have bits that bug out)
  • Capn' Bubs (some textures work, others broken)
Tested by tiagobmiranda:
  • Marvel Squadmate - Deadpool (no textures)
  • [PAYDAY] Payday 2: Masks (no textures, which is no surprise since there is a disclaimer at its description stating that it doesn't work with the propaganda center)
  • Star Wars Helmets (no textures, causes lag. R.I.P. Platoon, and thanks for the awesome mod)

Cheers for this.
 
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