kierany9's video: The Great Filter - XCOM Unpossible Episode 2

The Great Filter theory states that for there to be no observable advanced life, some phase of the evolutionary process that is hard to surpass must exist. Whether it is ahead of or behind us we don't know. For XCOM that phase is April, the Great Filter is real, it wears a blue suit with yellow shades and drinks your rookie tears from a goddamn mug. Timestamps: 00:00 - Mission 6 04:30 - Mission 7 10:16 - Mission 8 13:34 - Mission 9 19:33 - Mission 10 Music Used: Main Menu* - X-Com: UFO Defense Soundtrack Flirt With Bomb - Yakuza Kiwami Soundtrack Combat Music 4* - XCOM: Enemy Unknown Soundtrack Ruby Delusions (Eggman Boss 1) - Sonic Mania Soundtrack Boss 2 - Donkey Kong Jungle Climber Soundtrack Won't Stop, Just Go! ...for Green Forest - Sonic Adventure 2 Soundtrack Deep Woods - Sonic and the Black Knight Soundtrack Destroyed Skyworld - Kid Icarus Uprising Soundtrack Combat Music 8* - XCOM: Enemy Unknown Soundtrack Glimmering Gift (Super Transformation) - Sonic Mania Soundtrack Sanctuary Guardian - Earthbound Soundtrack *Unofficial name The music used list is only the overdubbed music, some in-game soundtracks are not listed. Q: Where's the enemy files segment on Outsiders? A: When one of them actually puts up a fight. Q: Thin Me- A: Holy shit, Salt Induction: Maximum does not begin to explain why Thin Men are the stuff of nightmares. Six HP is a ton for April, the first thing that's guaranteed to oneshot them besides rockets are Plasma Rifles, good luck getting those before August. And unlike Floaters, they aren't suicidal enough to think that flying is a decent substitute for high cover and have more than enough aim to start killing troops even without going for the crazy flanks they're known for. Tanking a hit without armour is unlikely, and even with armour a crit, a second shot or poison damage can send you to the morgue in an instant. This is why you need tac rigging or lasers the moment April rolls in, you will not have the damage output to consistently kill them otherwise. Thin Men truly are the great filter of both the tactical and strategy layer in Impossible. Q - Battlescape: How do you not squadwipe in general? A: Mitigate as much risk as possible at all times. Have a grenade ready to finish an alien off if the kill isn't guaranteed. Hunker down in high cover for +80 Defense if your odds to hit are poor and you need another turn to rocket or something. Low cover is +20 and should only be used if the other option is staying in the open. Retreating out of line of sight is preferable to taking shots in low cover. Count your aliens and see how many are on each mission type with ufopaedia (the XCOM fandom wiki is trash, don't use it). And don't forget the law of large numbers. Given enough 30% shots, there is a 100% chance one of them will hit. Whether it'll hit you or the ayys is another question entirely. Q - Battlescape: Handling Terror missions? A: Terror missions are easier than regular missions as long as you're well equipped. Sure, you're on a timer due to the civvies but this isn't Long War, as long as one person survives you've passed.. The only aliens you'll encounter in April terrors are Floaters, Chryssalids and Zombies. Even in June and August you won't be running into anything that doesn't show up on a regular abduction, it's only at the tail-end of a campaign where you really need to be careful on these. Q - Geoscape: What to do in terms of construction? A: While most people swear by doing a satellite rush, building a second uplink in March and launching four satellites, I found it far too damaging to my tactical layer/battlescape to even try. Failing a mission because your soldiers weren't equipped is going to counteract any geoscape panic gains you could've made from launching a satellite most of the time. Building the uplink on April before the 15th (With three sats ordered before the 10th) is fine, as you should be able to start mitigating an outright loss with most of your launches. However, having more sats will snowball pretty hard into having more income in the later months, and maybe even continent bonuses. Losing a lot of countries early can seriously hamstring that. Foreshadowing. Q - Geoscape: Why Egypt/Argentina/Brazil over France? A: France gives mediocre money, the continent bonus was locked out last month, and both Africa and South America have very good continent bonuses for the early-game. All-In increases all monthly council funding by 30%, while We Have Ways makes interrogations instant. With the highest-paying countries of the continent, Russia and the UK, being lost there's not much incentve to go for Europe anymore except to prevent a game over.