Gene Mods (Long War)

This page may be outdated. It is up-to-date for version b14. The latest version is 1.0.

Gene mods work similarly to how they work in vanilla, though the set of available mods is different. Please note the following:

• Secondary heart does not protect the Volunteer from mortal wounds. A fatal shot will kill him/her instead of triggering the perk. This behavior only pertains to the final mission, it is a vanilla mechanic.
• Neural Damping is unavailable to Psi-trained troops.
• It is also possible to "switch" between any of two GeneMod types within each slot categories for a cost.
• Gene modded troopers cannot become MECs or vice-versa.
• Mimetic Skin (from EW) has been replaced by Iron Skin. Although, it is still available (even if slightly nerfed!) as a Psi power.
• Adrenal Neurosympathy grants +10 aim, +5 crit, +2 mob, and removes panic from all soldiers within LoS when triggered. The buff lasts for 2 turns.
• Firing a rocket always counts as a miss, activating the Hyper-Reactive Pupils bonus. However the aim bonus does not reduce rocket scatter.

Gene mods

Name	Slot	Prerequisite	Description	Fatigue (hours)	Cost
Neural Damping	Brain	Berserker Autopsy	Confers +20 will when defending against Psi attacks and immunity to panic. If the soldier is mind controlled, the control is cancelled and the soldier is stunned for 1 turn instead. Neural damped soldiers cannot learn psionic skills and psionic soldiers cannot be neural damped.	+6	§20	12	10
Smart Macrophages	Brain	Sectoid Autopsy	Medikits and Restorative Mist heal 2 HP more when used on the soldier. Confers complete immunity to poison and acid.	+3	§15	8	4
Hyper Reactive Pupils	Eyes	Xenogenetics	Confers +10 Aim on any shot after a miss.	+3	§10	4	3
Depth Perception	Eyes	Xenogenetics	Height Advantage confers an additional +5 Aim and +5 critical chance.	+3	§10	4	3
Secondary Heart	Chest	Muton Elite Autopsy	Causes soldiers to bleed out instead of dying the first time they go to zero health in a mission. The bleed-out timer is extended by 2 turns. Prevents loss of Will from critical wounds.	+6	§30	10	10
Adrenal Neurosympathy	Chest	Muton Autopsy	Overloads the soldiers adrenal glands: when a kill is confirmed the soldier emits pheromones that grant offensive benefits to all nearby squad mates. Cannot be used more than once every 5 turns.	+9	§20	10	6
Bioelectric Skin	Skin	Seeker Autopsy	The soldier projects an electric field from his or her skin, revealing but not alerting nearby enemies, and is immune to strangulation.	+6	§25	10	6
Iron Skin	Skin	Cyberdisc Autopsy	Confers 1.0 damage reduction.	+12	§20	10	10
Muscle Fiber Density	Legs	Thin Man Autopsy	Confers superhuman leg strength, enabling the soldier to reach high positions without the need for ladders or other climbing aids.	+9	§20	12	7
Adaptive Bone Marrow	Legs	Chryssalid Autopsy	Regenerate wounds. For humans, wound recovery time is reduced by 66% (stacks with Advanced Surgery), and unit regenerates 2 hp every turn up to the HP max without armor.	+9	§30	12	7

Tactical Advice

Gene mods are relatively cheap for their benefit, both in terms of cash and, to a lesser extent, Meld. But bear in mind there are several logistical matters to be aware of:

• The mechanics for how much Meld you are likely to get per mission at a given point in a campaign. In short: the better you're doing, the less you'll get.
• The number of soldiers you have & are swapping out from fatigue. Thus, each modded soldier spends less time out in the field, and vice versa: each time you go into the field, you might not have a modded soldier to go into it-- unless you try to mod every applicable soldier (which you won't have the Meld to do).
• Other projects with priority that use Meld, such as MEC suits which can be freely swapped between MEC soldiers between missions.

Basically, you may be playing your soldiers (most of them and/or most of the time) in Vanilla EU style of going without mods: gene mods will then be for when you can afford to splurge on them. So, what you may want to do instead is have a dedicated 'Mod Squad' of soldiers who'll be the focus for genetic enhancement, and specialize and deploy them individually with your Strike team depending on which type of mission you're about to head out on. For example: send a front-line soldier or two with Macrophages and Muscle Fiber on Thin men-infested Council Missions, or Dampened soldiers if facing an Ethereal on a UFO-- but Bioelectric soldiers can stay home if the Hyperwave Uplink says there's no Seekers.

Also, have a bit of consideration for who may be in your final squad for the Temple Ship: choose them early and mod as you go, or pick them later and just save enough Meld to dump mods into them towards the end.

• Neural Dampening vs Smart Macrophages

As mentioned, Dampening cannot be placed on soldiers that are already Psionic. You may want to put this on soldiers that have good skills and a high Aim score but, by (lack of) leveling or surviving Critical Wounds, do not have very high will. Then at worst, their low Will score may make them 'bait' for Sectoids and Ethereals, and they'll be stunned for a turn, but it is one of the most Meld-expensive mods.

For everyone else: there's Macrophages. Macrophages are moderately expensive, but have a fairly short tank and fatigue time, making them easy to apply to a large number of soldiers. The +2 health can be a nice boost to your packmaster medkits.

• Hyper-reactive Pupils vs Depth Perception

Nearly identical to in EW, the recommendations are the same: Hyper-reactive is great for regular Overwatchers and any soldier with one of the "shoot twice" abilities, Depth Perception for the likes of Snipers flitting around in Archangel Armor. Both are cheap in funds and Meld, and add only a small bit to fatigue.

• Secondary Heart vs Adrenal Neurosympathy

Also a similar decision to EW, except for the Secondary Heart now being the most expensive mod. Secondary Heart is best used for protecting your Psionic soldiers and their Will score. You'll still be cycling out soldiers, Psionics even more so, there's much less chance for an individual one to get killed/Critically Wounded. Adrenal Neurosympathy gives all-around boosts, but also comes with a longer recovery time.

Secondary heart synergizes well with revive medics, allowing troops to be knocked out and then revived without incurring the will penalty.

• Bioelectric Skin vs Iron Skin

As the Battle Scanner is now a free item that, however, takes up an inventory space, this choice comes down to how you want to deal with Seekers in Long War: Battle Scanners or Bioelectric Skin (or neither, and the use of AoE attacks instead). Knowing if an alien is behind that door with Bioelectric Skin can be useful, but it has somewhat limited range, while a Battle Scanner is a thrown object with very significant toss _and_ scan range, but can't see through obstacles and opens the alien 'Holodoors' if thrown through one. Otherwise, the only high argument against "Iron Skin for everyone!" is the +12 hours to fatigue.

• Muscle-fiber Density vs Adaptive Bone Marrow

Both are attractive options, both give a significant penalty to Fatigue time, Marrow's a little pricier than Muscle Fiber. Otherwise, also nearly the same as vanilla EW. The biggest change LW brings is that the consideration that more aliens means more hits, and perhaps not enough Medikit uses, so Marrow can take up the slack.

See also

Long War: Soldiers
	Soldiers Assault Infantry Rocketeer Gunner Sniper Scout Medic Engineer
	MEC Troopers Marauder Valkyrie Archer Goliath Jaeger Pathfinder Guardian Shogun
	Officers Psionics Gene Mods S.H.I.V.s