Murphy's Laws (X-COM)

Battlescape (UFO Defense)

Soldiers

• If a soldier can miss, he will.
  • If a soldier can hit another soldier while missing, he will.
• If a soldier has a high explosive, then he will have to commit suicide for the group to win.
• If a soldier can panic, he will.
  • If he is holding a primed Proximity Grenade, he will drop it and start running.
  • If he is holding any other primed explosive, he will drop it and stay right there.
  • If he is holding something else, he will drop it and run right next to an alien.
• The probability of a soldier getting MCed is proportional to the lethality of the weapons he is carrying.
• The probability of a soldier going berserk is proportional to the number of friendly units he can hit from where he's standing.
• Your troops invariably display better accuracy and reactions when mind controlled than they do under your own orders.
  • The opposite is true when you mind control an alien.
• The soldier you gave your shiny new heavy weapon to will turn out to have shitty Psi Strength and/or Morale. You will discover this the hard way.
• If a soldier has a Rocket Launcher, he will get MCed while still in the craft.
• Your first unit out is always shot down.
  • Your first unit out is always your commander.
• A wounded soldier will always die just before you find the last alien.
• As soon as you get better armor, the aliens get better weapons.
• Flares will always land where they cannot be picked up.
• If your base is attacked, you will always get flares instead of Heavy Plasmas.
• You will always end up short 1 TU for the action you wanted to do.
• If there is a single square where an alien grenade can hit all your soldiers at once, that is the square it will land in.
• The soldiers with the worst stats will always be the first to get promoted.
  • When you build the Psi Lab, you will always discover that your highly-trained officers are psi weaklings.
• On Ethereal Terror Missions, you will always get the maximum number of Sectopods possible.
• When you have finally perfected the art of UFO assaults - safe initial deployment, proper scout and sweep tactics, correct breaching methods - that will be the mission an enemy commander shows up with a Blaster Launcher and nukes your entire team while it's still on the Skyranger
• The only thing your soldiers are good for is warning each other about the Blaster Launching-wielding alien right around the corner.
  • Considering the laws above, it's pretty easy to guess exactly how they warn the rest of your squad about said Blaster Launcher.
    • They warn your squad with an explosion, followed by a scream.
• If a proximity grenade can land on a soldier, it will.
• A soldier with pockets full of pre-primed grenades will fall unconscious right next to your Commander.
• That point-blank reaction shot can be guaranteed by giving the guy a Rocket Launcher.
• The chance of soldiers panicking and running out of the access lift on Cydonia is relative to the amount of soldiers in the access lift.
  • And into direct fire from a cyberdisc.

Civilians

• If a civilian sees a fire, he will run into it.
• If a civilian sees an alien, he will move right next to it.
• If a civilian can block your line of fire on an alien, he will do so.
• Civilians are attracted by armed proximity grenades.
• Civilians inevitably block the doorway you need to use right before you get there.
• If a civilian is near an alien, any attempt to save him by shooting the alien will hit the civilian instead.
• Civilians will go out of their way to get shot in a Terror Mission.

Aliens

• If an alien can hit, it will.
• If an alien tries to MC you, it will always succeed.
• Alien commanders will always kill themselves (with their Blaster Launchers) when you're on track to capture them .
• If there are Chryssalids, you will get at least one zombified soldier.
  • You never want to know the answer to "Why did the Chryssalid cross the road?".
• If a dying Cyberdisc can blow up one of your men, it will.
• Unconscious aliens with melee attacks will wake up when you least expect them to.
• If you open a door and turn left, the aliens will all be on the right.
• Aliens are smarter than they look.
• This one is universal for all of the series:
  • "Gaahh! Come back here and let me stun/melee you, you little shit!"
• Aliens can smell proximity grenades.

Geoscape (UFO Defense)

• When you need money the most, your funders will sign treaties with the aliens.
  • The first country to drop funding is always the one that gave the most money.
• As soon as you get a new base built, it will be attacked.
  • As soon as you get a new base fully equipped and operational, UFO activity in that area will drop to zero.
• If your fully developed base with 12 Missile Defences is successfully weathering a retaliation mission every couple days, the 1-in-30 battleship that makes it through will inevitably do so when all your experienced soldiers are out on missions.
• The more money you've saved, the higher the chance the aliens will do something that forces you to waste it.
  • The amount of money you lose is proportional to how badly you need whatever you were saving up for.
• Terror sites always appear at night.
  • Or at noon, located conveniently so that night falls the second you arrive.
• If there is one tiny lake in the middle of 100 km of dry land, your Interceptors will inevitably shoot the UFO down over that exact spot.
• The chance that a crashed UFO's Elerium survived is proportional to how much you already have stockpiled.
• Landed UFO's will always take off before you can get to them.
  • Unless they're filled with a species of alien you aren't equipped to deal with, in which case they will stick around forever.
    • And when you finally get the equipment to deal with them, they fly away, never to be seen again.
      • Until you have none of that equipment left to deal with them, because the base closest to them was destroyed.
• UFO's will always arrive while your Skyranger is refueling from a two day patrol.
• If you have forgotten to save the game for at least 3 missions, the game will crash.
  • The game will always crash when it is the least convenient.
• If your craft is carrying no flares whatsoever, it will inevitably arrive five minutes after nightfall.
  • If you've wasted half your 80-item limit on flares and incendiary ammo, you will arrive at high noon.
• Alien UFO scouts will always outrun your Interceptors.
• Building a new base where there is heavy UFO activity? Seems like a good time for the Aliens to stop all activity in that area, and move it to a new area.
  • That new area consists of the highest-funding countries.
• It's always exciting downing a UFO on a tiny island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Too bad it's always an Ethereal-filled Battleship.

Cityscape (Apocalypse)

• If you're almost broke after buying a new flagship for your fleet, it will be destroyed in the next UFO incursion.
• The pride of your fleet is always stuck in alien dimension when you get attacked by a Mothership.
• UFOs carrying infiltrators always spawn at the gate you don't have covered.
• Griffon AFV is tough. The road under it is not. The tracks are just for show.
• There are only two types of vehicles that are always in abundance on the market: Blazer bikes and Stormdogs.
• While en route to a building, your craft will shoot at a Cult civilian car and demolish half of the city trying to hit it. However, the car will survive.
• Megapol is useless.
  • Transtellar is annoying.
    • Everyone else is both annoying and useless.
• Government's weekly paycheck will buy you a Lawpistol clip. Maybe two.
• If your base is in a slum, a single stray shot from a light disruptor will destroy it all.
  • If your base is in a warehouse, said stray shot will still hit the tile with your agents.
• A hoverbike swarm is a good idea. Too bad they'll all get shot down anyway because of sheer dumb luck on the aliens' part.
• Research will always be completed right after when you needed it the most.
• After a firefight in the city, the only one to be blamed for the devastation will be you, even if it was an Overspawn that did it.
• The Overspawn will coincidentally be dropped right at your doorstep.
• The Overspawn will never, ever get hurt from falling debris. Unless you drop the said debris and level half of the city with it.
• People Tubes can collapse from an angry glare.
• You're the only one who has a problem with the aliens. Every other corp gets along with them fine.
  • Transtellar in particular will always be dying for a chance to jump in bed with the aliens.
• Subversion attacks will succeed, 100%.
• Your carefully built Dimension Probe will be welcomed by a volley of Heavy Disruptor Guns.
• Your very first invasion of the Alien Dimension will require an hour's savescumming to get it right without being reduced to scrap metal.
• You will forget to not to move the X-COM craft when you succeed in destroying an alien building, killing everyone in the process.
• The alien Infiltration site will always be Hard to remember.

Battlescape (Apocalypse)

• If your base is raided, there will be as few of your agents spawning as possible.
  • Said agents will spawn as far away from the access lift as possible.
    • Guess where the scientists will appear.
• If you're raiding a building, there will always be a trigger-happy idiot with a heavy launcher.
  • Despite your best efforts, he will manage to fire at least one missile.
    • And he will do so even if you're breathing in his face.
      • There is no way to avoid the missile and injuries or casualties from it.
        • Even if you somehow actually manage to avoid the missile, it'll bring down the building on you.
• Live explosives are seemingly attracted to large concentrations of dead cultist bodies with all the loot you came here for.
• If an agent in a squad gets attacked by a brainsucker, the rest of the squad won't hit it at point blank range.
  • Or they'll fire a missile launcher. Guess the results.
• If you turn around the corner where you think that last alien is hiding, it'll turn out to be half a dozen of Anthropods. All armed to the teeth.
• A berserking agent will cause more chaos and destruction than all of your other agents put together. And it won't be directed at the enemy.
• If someone throws a Boomeroid at an agent, he'll try to run away from it.
  • Because it will always turn out that you forgot to set him to aggressive mode.
• If you try to capture a Megaspawn, it'll die before you can stun it.
  • As will half the agents trying to stun the damn thing in the first place.
• You'd wish you gave that mind controlled agent a Toxigun instead of a Dimension Missile Launcher.
• You'll encounter cloaked and flying Skeletoids much more often than you'd like to.
  • Cloaking never works for you. Neither does flying, actually.
• Good stuff always comes too late.
  • Personal teleporters do not exist.
• Psi attacks are only successful when they're not necessary.
• Dynamic music always ignores what you're actually doing.
• That agent you sent to scout ahead will always be the one without a motion scanner.
• Every raid is a horrible decision between causing property damage and greed. Either way, you lose.
• The agent with a Mind Bender won't see the enemy until he's standing right next to it at all. Period.
• You will forget to capture a live Micronoid aggregate.
• Toxigun ammo, Vortex mines and Personal Shields come in only two varieties: "not enough" and "none".

Strategic (Enemy Unknown)

• When you need §§§ the most, the US and Russia (which you have satellite coverage over) will pull out of the XCOM project.
• Your satellites will always be available one day too late to prevent a country from withdrawing.
  • Even if it shows up before "Council Report" on the event list.
• When you do have satellites available, you will never have enough Satellite Uplink/Nexus space for them.
• When you do have Satellite Uplink/Nexus, you will never have enough satellites.
• If you have one more satellite to go before getting a continent's bonus, that last country will pull out of the XCOM project.
  • The one continent's bonus you don't want to get? The aliens will ignore that continent.
• You will always be at least §1 short of buying the next level of armor/weapons for all your troops.
• If a Colonel can be checked for having the Psi gift, he won't have it.
• If a Rookie can be checked for having the Psi gift, he will.
• Your interceptor will always lose contact 0.1 seconds before the enemy UFO is destroyed.
• Your interceptor will blow up one round of fire exchange after you press the Abort button.
• Your interceptor will miss every shot.
  • The UFO will have perfect aim and land every single hit.
    • After an interceptor lands a few hits on a Supply Barge it's shot down. So you sortie another interceptor and it's shot down/loses contact without hitting the damaged UFO even once.
• Just a bit more than a day from getting your Colonel out of the medbay? Time for a Terror Mission!
• Just a bit less than a day from getting your Colonel out of the medbay? Time for a Terror Mission!
  • Fast forwarding will result in the Terror Mission succeeding for the aliens before you can react to your Colonel getting out of the medbay.
• Just a bit more than a day before your latest and greatest research completes? Time for a Terror Mission!
• Any other time it's inconvenient? Time for a Terror Mission!
  • Followed by abductions less than 24 hours later.
    • Followed by a council mission less than 24 hours later.
      • Followed by a Battleship coming to destroy your satellite less than 24 hours later.
        • Oh, you recently finished the Hyperwave Uplink? Here, have the Overseer UFO, 12 hours after that battleship.
          • On the same continent as your surely-damaged Firestorm.
            • And once you lose that... Time for a Terror Mission!
• Steam vents will be placed in inconvenient locations.
  • Second floor steam vents will block your 2x2 Satellite Uplink block.
    • The remaining steam vents will be on the 4th floor.
      • In the corner.
        • Behind 3 solid squares of rock.
          • The vent's spot is also solid rock.
• Research or Foundry upgrades will be completed one day after a critical mission appears.
• The only way you can afford the next item or facility you need, is to sell materials on the grey market.
  • Specifically, just enough to not have the materials left to build it.
• When the option to start researching the various Plasma Weapons becomes available, you will not have enough Weapon Fragments.
  • Heavy Floaters will also start appearing on your next mission.
  • You'll also be trying to research the Firestorm.
• You will forget to equip your shiny new weapon.
  • If not, your save (or at least when you last saved) may forget for you.
• .......................... Time for a Terror Mission!
• Oh, three steam vents all set up for awesome adjacency bonus! Too bad that two of them are directly underneath the Satellite Uplink!
• The only time you miss-click when accusing a country of hosting the EXALT Base, is when that country provided the most money.
  • It is also the eighth country to leave!
    • On Impossible difficulty.
      • Ironman Mode was also on.
        • And you decided that right after you destroy the EXALT Base, you would go right on ahead and assault the Temple Ship!
          • Not that you would have survived, anyways, everybody was panicking!
• Special: If you're trying to test something for this very 'paedia, the situation you're after will never occur.
  • Instead, something else will happen that will give you another idea to test. Guess what will happen then.

Tactical (Enemy Unknown)

• If a soldier's chance to hit is <99%, he will miss.
  • Especially if the target is at 1 HP.
    • Doubly so if that's your last action for the turn.
      • Exponentially so, proportional to how dangerous the target is. Like a Sectopod that's now flanking several soldiers.
• If a soldier's chance to hit is 100%, he won't do enough damage to kill the alien.
  • If a soldier's chance to hit is 100%, the game will glitch and turn that full-face Alloy Cannon blast into a spray of harmless confetti.
• The left mouse button is context sensitive; it will always do exactly what you didn't want it to.
• If a soldier's a heavy, he/she is going to have terrible accuracy.
  • The range and blast radius of a heavy's rocket launcher will be a few tiles away from the nearest alien.
    • Your heavy will never be in range to fire off a rocket.
• If a soldier's a sniper, he/she is going to have terrible accuracy FOR MOST OF THE GAME.
  • A sniper will have squad sight on either a heavily wooded UFO crash/landing sight or a Terror Mission with one or two buildings that cover the entire map.
• If a soldier's an assault, he/she is going to have terrible accuracy EVEN AT POINT BLANK RANGE.
  • If you activate Rapid Fire, both shots will miss a point blank Sectopod (Who has only eight health bars left) despite the second shot's hit chance being 85%.
• If a soldier's a support, he/she is going to have terrible accuracy WITH ANYTHING BUT A S.C.O.P.E. AND A LIGHT PLASMA RIFLE.
• If an alien's chance to hit is >1%, he will hit.
  • If an alien's chance to hit is <1%, he will destroy your full cover.
• If an alien's mind control chance is >1%, it will work.
• When aiming at an Ethereal with the last shot of your turn, it will reflect it.
  • Especially if that soldier has only 1 HP.
• If the vehicle that your soldier is dashing to for cover can be set on fire, it will be.
  • That is, if the soldier survives the alien Overwatch shot that will set the vehicle on fire.
    • If so, then the vehicle's explosion will finish him/her off.
      • Not to forget that this specific soldier, was your Colonel who had been with you since the first mission.
• Your soldier will always have the exact amount of health for a vehicle to blow him up.
• You will always reveal new enemies on your last move of the turn.
  • Who will then take up flanking positions behind anyone who dashed.
• The more soldiers who perform an Overwatch reaction shot against a single alien, the more likely they will all miss.
  • Soldiers who hit the alien will barely kill the alien.
    • The alien, in turn, will kill your highest-ranking soldier.
      • After killing the highest-ranking soldier, the other aliens will come in and mop everyone else up.
• When you have your whole squad on overwatch they will all shoot one floater.
  • And then all die to his Chryssalid buddy.
• Your Revive spec medic will always be the one critically wounded.
• When trying to capture a commander with one stunner, he will be the one MCed,
• Aliens will always hit soldier's hunkering down behind high cover.
  • The alien will do just enough damage to not kill him, but to cause him to panic.
    • The panicking soldier will kill a soldier and start a panic chain.
• Panicking soldiers will always have 100% to hit.
• Smoke grenades will always improve alien accuracy.
  • Mutons and Floaters will always throw grenades into smoke.
• If a soldier can panic, it will.
  • Soldiers that panic will aim for the highest ranking officer he can see.
    • Even behind high cover, on a higher elevation, and covered by a smoke grenade, a panicking rookie will still be able to kill the "protected" Colonel.
• Rockets will always fly off target.
  • ESPECIALLY when you squad is surrounded by explosive vehicles and forklifts.
    • At a gas station
      • Then everything will explode
        • Then everything will explode and everyone will panic
          • Even your SHIVs
            • And they will shoot your highest-ranked soldier
              • And he will die
                • He will also have the psionic gift
                  • He also has one of the highest starting and leveling Will/Aim scores you ever got, in any playthrough.
                    • And he/she will also be named after you.
                      • And he/she will be carrying your only medic kit.
• Aliens will position themselves right outside the radius of a grenade throw.
  • If a grenade can clip through and explode harmlessly under ground while you are trying to aim it, it will.
• When it is time to face Sectopods or Cyberdiscs, your HEAT ammo heavies will not be with you.
  • When it is time to face Sectopods or Cyberdiscs, your HEAT ammo heavies will miss every shot.
• When it is time to face Muton Elites, your psionics will not be with you.
• Your soldiers are always one grid point away from moving to safely flank an alien.
• When a large UFO lands and you assault with your elite squad you will fight 3 Floaters, 3 Sectoids and a Sectoid Commander.
• When a moderate alien abduction comes up and you assault with a squad comprised of your Col. Sniper, squaddies, and rookies for training purposes, you will fight 9 Mutons (who will each throw their grenades asap), a Cyberdisc, and 2 Drones you just can't seem to hit.
• Even when you use the rookie to scout ahead, he will always stumble on no less than every enemy on the map on a single turn, who will then, with most of the laws stated above, wipe your elite squad before you can say Jenkins.
• You decide to research offensive tech first and the Arc Thrower later only to find that Sectoids have been removed from the alien roster. But after killing 7 Mutons on a map you decide to zap the last two for their weapons only to have the last group be a trio of Sectoids.
• The Overseer will only appear when you have no Firestorms.
  • When you build your firestorm with dodge matrix, fusion lance, and uplink targeting, the Overseer will appear in the continent your new Firestorm is NOT stationed in
• Your MCed alien will always run out of usable turns before they can bust the asses off of some of their little alien friends.
  • ALWAYS
    • Especially on the final mission of the entire game.
• MCed aliens will always activate no less than two squads that were just behind them.
• Your sniper with Snap Shot will never be useful for anything, ever.
• Your sniper with Squadsight will never be in a good position.
  • And when he is, a tree will block his line of sight to finish off that one alien flanking your soldiers.
• The alien with a grenade will go first. He will toss the grenade , without moving, negating any troopers on Overwatch, and removing cover from you forward trooper.
  • Next alien will kill your now-exposed trooper.
    • You will then have to wait 2-3 minutes for the other 9 or so Aliens to take their turn and batter your remaining troops.
      • Also, it's been 5 rounds since you last saved.
• The range for a soldier flying with Archangel Armor will always be "One less than it takes to get into cover, or out of range."
• On a Battleship raid, there will always be one alien that runs away, forcing you to have to chase them down.
  • Backwards.
• The game has no problem sending and activating every alien squad in an Abductor or Supply Barge at you in 1 turn.
  • If not, that's because the high-level alien squad somehow noticed you from the other side of the ship.
• The council mission reward will always be either what you don't need, or not enough of what you do.
• When fighting Thin Men, you will always activate 2 squads at a time.
• When fighting Floaters, they will always Launch to flank just tiles away from your Sniper. No soldier will be close enough to help her.
• When fighting Mutons, you will activate a squad after you have finished moving at least two soldiers. Who you placed right next to each other.
  • If you think two soldiers were just far enough apart to not both be hit by 1 grenade: turns out they weren't.
    • Both of their cover is now gone, fyi.
• When fighting Chryssalids, they will always be at least close enough to hit your soldiers from a diagonal tile, if not closer.
• When fighting Cyberdiscs, when they are open, your hardest-hitting soldier will not be able to attack them.
  • Because it opened up to kill said soldier in the previous turn.
• When fighting Sectopods, the answer to "Which soldier are they going to fire at?" The answer is always "the one taking cover behind something explosive."
  • On the rare chance that it's Chest Cannon misses, the shot will still hit something explosive.
    • Specifically, something that another soldier is taking cover behind.
      • Whom it will then fire upon.
• When fighting a Sectopod, after your two troops have been battered by both Chest Cannon blasts despite being behind full cover and in the middle of a smoke grenade cloud, one moves and triggers a Reaction Shot.
• When fighting an Ethereal, it will either:
  • Be in a different room than usual.
  • Become activated when you pass within 10 feet of the door.
  • Become activated when your last turn is to MC an Elite Muton or Heavy Floater that would be flanking it's buddies.
    • Which it will then immediately kill.
• Your first shot with a shiny new weapon will miss.
• Despite bipods being visible on several weapons, your soldiers do not seem to recognise their existence for steadying and making more accurate shots.
• Your Support with Sprint and a Skeleton Suit or Ghost Armor will always be one movement short of saving a civilian.
• Your soldier will make a crazy-ass, low-percentage, gun-pointing-the-wrong-way-for-some-reason Overwatch shot with your currently-most powerful weapon.... on a wounded Sectoid.
• At the point in the game when you have all continents armed with Firestorms all with Fusion Lances (Highly unlikely, especially considering the laws above) that is the only time when the Aliens give up on sending the big UFOs and start sending small scouts
• On a Battleship raid, you send in a rookie to investigate the main room, thus activating all 20+ Aliens who just "happened" to spawn in there. They will then all hide, and when you think yourself so clever for taking up positions for multi-pronged attack on the main room, it turns out, they were all on Overwatch.
  • And yes, each Alien is just so positioned so that each one of your soldiers will have a chance to get shot at.
    • This will occur more often on Ironman Mode.
      • On Impossible Difficulty.
        • It turns out, this was also supposed to be the day that you got the only Psionic Soldier you ever found got strong enough to become the volunteer.
          • Afterwards, the game will glitch so that you will never find another Psionic Soldier in your whole playthrough
            • Not that it matters, your entire elite squad got wiped out, when they had all their fancy armor and weapons.
• "Don't shoot the Elerium, don't shoot the Elerium---- shit."
  • "Don't blow up the power source, don't blow up the power source ---- crap."
    • "Blow power source! Blow! Blow! ---- come on!"
• Your soldier will miss the alien and shoot the meld instead.
  • Especially if you have them flanked.
• When your favorite soldier gets critically injured, you clear out the Muton Elite that hurt him. Too bad there is a group of sectoids all the way across the map.
  • It will take a full turn of dashing for your Sprinter support in a Skeleton Suit to reach them
    • They will all proceed to hide behind full cover just out of your sight.
      • When you finally see them for your Squadsight Sniper with Double Tap will hit two of them, however, there are three sectoids
        • Not that it matters, they were all on overwatch, and considering the laws above, they will all get critical shots on your soldier, and kill her
          • That is, IF you find them.
• Have Frag Grenades? Any aliens in range will have four HP left.
  • Alien Grenades or Mind Fray? Six.
    • And it will be your only viable action: any attempts at firing a gun will miss.
      • C'mon: it's not even out yet, but you just know that the only time you'll have the Needle Grenade with you, aliens WILL take cover in such a way that only ONE would be affected by it at any time.
• Speaking of Enemy Within: you shall soon become familiar with the sound of exploding Meld canisters.
  • Which is Dr. Vahlen annoying voiceover.
• Two words: naughty tentacles.
• Alien: "You brought a soldier with a Med-kit, I'll just Critically wound him then..."
• "Ooh look, the last meld canister.. and..... that's a group of Muton Elites... And a Cyberdisc... or three"
• Need 5 more Meld? Check out that Heavy Floater with only one health left!
  • Looks like it's running away, no biggie, you'll just follow it.
    • And activate its Mechtoid Buddies!
• While you are almost finished with Confounding Light, you have one turn left to activate the train, too bad the only soldier that can make it is being Overwatch-camped by that Muton who was just air-dropped.
  • Even though that move would have required a dash!
    • He was also an assault that was gonna get promoted that mission. Guess which Rank.
• The mission where your Squaddie Sniper levels up is alaways the mission that Sqaud Sight would have been supremely useful for.
• Don't EVER pick favorites, they'll just die anyways
• "Ok, gene mod do-- mission, ok, reload to get my soldier. OK, mission done, now to gene mo-- damnit, 'nother mission... ok, done, finally. Allright---- oh come the fuck on, Council, I'm busy here! Now what do you waaaAAAHHFUCKCHRYSSALIDS!!"
• Yes, Meld Canisters provide full cover. If you're actually using them for that, you have only yourself to blame.
• Enemy Within. Because Sectopods really needed the ability to outright ignore half of all incoming damage.
  • AND be able to freely and deliberatley target your cover: "That'ssssssssssssssssssss a nice wall you got there~!"
• Your Heavy will never be in a good spot to launch a mission/life-saving rocket.
  • Eventually, you'll fire it, because "might as well."
    • Then, and only then, on the next turn, will they be in the perfect situation to fire that shot you just wasted.
• Training Roulette:
  • You'll either get abilites that're near-useless to that class, or
  • You'll get high-tier abilities on the same Ranking, forcing you to choose between them.
    • Doubly so if they're abilites that would otherwise work well together.
      • The game will also pick the most useless skill for that soldier when he gets promoted to Major, like close combat specialist on your sniper.
• Damage Roulette:
  • Any time you need to do just enough damage to weaken an alien so that you have the maximum capture chance, you'll kill it instead. Maybe even crit it.
  • Any time you need to very definitely kill an alien (like the Chryssalid that wants to eat your Medic) you'll knock it down to 1hp.
    • The chance of this occurring increases significantly if this is the last action of your turn.
  • Any time the aliens shoot at your soldiers they'll do the maximum possible damage, especially if they're in cover and not flanked.
  • Any time the aliens shoot at your SHIVs they'll do the minimum possible damage... unless that SHIV is being used as cover.
• Hey, see that high-ground, full cover spot right over there? That looks like a great place to attack those aliens from. Go on over, pal.
  • Whoops, now they're out of line-of-sight. Tough break there, buddy.
• If you find yourself needing Revive, you're doing something wrong. Too bad you always need it thanks to all of the laws stated above.
• After spending some 3-5 rounds setting up a nice blitzkreig for the bridge of a UFO, just when you're ready to open the door, the alien CO pod will 'teleport' either halfway across the map, or in the perfect spot to counterattack.
  • This includes any other escorting pods, after the CO pod takes the Alien turn to open every door, revealing every soldier.
• The soldier with the arc-thrower will always be in the opposite direction that an alien you're trying to capture decides to run in.
  • Followed by spending the rest of the mission chasing the alien like the LAPD. Benny Hill theme optional, but recommended.
• The international symbol of the red cross on med kits is apparently the Intergalatic symbol for "Shoot me first."
• Any UFO that crashes into the ocean will be in a heavily forested area.
• The last alien alive will be a cloaked Seeker, that is now panicked and running away, in a large map. Good #&@%ing luck finding it.
  • Or hasn't panicked, but it's a Terror Mission and the lone Seeker's AI has decided to kill as many civilians as possible before going after your agents. But if you split the team up to rescue more at once...
• If an alien hides behind something explosive, one of several things will keep you from taking advantage of it:
  • Either you don't want to blow up the object,
  • Or a soldier is in the blast zone,
    • Especially if they're out of move, or there's no other safe place to move to.
  • Or you don't want to destroy it's equipment/fragments.
  • Or two of the above.
  • Or all three.
• The farther and more obtusely placed a Meld canister is, the more likely it is that stray fire will destroy it from the other end of the map.
• Trying to overwatch-spam to let Adaptive Bone Marrow heal non-armor HP? Here, have a crit to the face.
  • Courtesy of that wounded Sectoid that either only took 1 step into your POV, or didn't move at all.
• You will have the perfect Overwatch trap set up.
  • You will have a pod you didn't know was there walk into it.
    • You will batter the approaching aliens to a bloody pulp.
      • You will have the game lock up in Alien Activity.
        • You will have your last save be just before this. Any attempt to Overwatch Trap again will result in a lock up, again.
• Your full 6-man team of one specific nationality will be carved up by an Ethereal MCing half of them and deflecting all your plasma shots.

Long War

• You will always learn the hard way what new perks and Gene Mods the dev team has given the aliens.
  • To wit: Jumping Berserkers.
• Even if you did have the muscle to take down Abductors, their flight path will only be long enough to send one interceptor against them.
  • If at all.
• If you feel you're doing well: your confidence is ill-deserved.
  • The alien pod with two Mechtoids, a Sectopod, several drones, and a Sectoid Commander on the other side of that door will gladly demonstrate this.
    • Followed by the mixed Muton pack that just came up behind you.
      • And then by those cyberdiscs that decided to say hi.
• The first two shots in Air Combat will always be critical hits.... on your interceptor.
• There are, essentially, three results to Air Combat: the UFO crash lands, it DOAs, or your interceptor is KIA.
  • The result that will happen will be one of the two that you don't want.
• The first alien base will always appear (and remove a Council country from) the continent who's bonus you were hoping to get next.
• When you need meld the most, the game will glitch out and think you are doing good for some reason... so you will only get 3 meld per canister.

Combat (The Bureau)

• The agent you sent forward to flank one alien will then be fired upon by EVERY alien.
  • Any agent sent forward will be flanked. Twice.
• Any attempt to make a Sectopod turn around (so you can hit it's weak point) will fail to make it turn sufficiently, if at all.
• You'll run out of ammuntion at the worst possible time.
  • That includes just reloading, and flat-out running out of bullets alltogether.
• Even if you're replaying, you'll fail to notice the new weapon, or ammo sachel, that would have been really useful in the skirmish you just barely won a few seconds ago.
• There are the best kinds of weapon for a job, when entering a new skirmish. You will not be carrying it.
• You forgot to check a side-path, and just passed a checkpoint: and now you can't go back to check for ammo or backpack schematics.
  • By the way, you'll need that ammo in about 5 seconds.
• Even though Battle Focus slows down time, and it's just one click, it still won't be enough time to finish hitting Heal and save an agent from dying.
  • That goes double if the Agent in question is Carter.
• Like any other XCOM: An alien's location is always equal to: grenade toss range, plus explosion area, plus "just enough to not get caught in the blast."
  • Meanwhile, aliens toss like they pitch for the Dodgers.
• When attepting to interact with something, the θ of the angle that will allow you to do so is inverse to how ugently you need to do it.
• The agent ability you need right now? You still need to wait for it to reload.
  • When it does load, the only aliens left on the field are Sectoids and low-level Zudjari.
    • When, out of frustration, you use the ability to finish off the weakling: that's when the second wave of aliens shows up.
      • They are led by a Commander, or Muton (Elite), or Sectopod, or Gunship.
• When attempting to snipe, the alien will always move at the last second.
• The distance between an agent and a Muton will aways be less than the length of it's arm.
• Alien shields and heals will go up in the span of time between firing a kill shot, and when it would've hit.
• God help you if you have a wireless keyboard/mouse, and haven't charged the battery in the last 24 hours.

XCOM 2 (Strategic)

• Shen's dead, baby. Shen's dead.
• You will get greedy in going for the random supply discoveries, and forget to progress with Resistance activities.
• You will start building your resistance network.... in the wrong direction to the closest Blacksite.
• You will get a priority mission JUST before completing a scan.
• The rare time a soldier gets a cross-class training Perk... it'll be something useless for how you play that soldier.
  • And you'll already have six people lined up for retraining.

XCOM 2 (Tactical)

• You will be distracted by Snek Tits at inopportune moments.
• Sectopods are basically Metal Gears now. Have fun with that.
• Hours worth of careful sneaking will be ruined by an unfriendly civvie walking around the corner.
• The procedurally generated map for that critical mission will be as follows:
  • ADVENT stronghold: a high-terrain fortress with turrets, high cover, and choke points.
  • Your cover: cars.
• If the Sectoid on the map decides to mind control anyone, it will be your Ranger
  • You will always be in slashing distance of this Ranger
    • The Ranger will always be your Blademaster
• The one time you get 4 damage with a grenade is on the soldier that drops loot
• Your Repeater won't activate on a Berserker but it will sure as hell execute a basic soldier
• You will never get Blacksite Intel drops
  • Particularity when the Doom Counter is nearly full.
    • When you do get one: expect the next site to be somewhere you've already made contact with.
• You will learn that the game has chests with random loot in them only after finishing Legendary Ironman run.
• The Alien Leaders will always spawn on a timed escort mission.
  • Doubly so if the 'reduce turn limit' Dark Event is active.