Talk:Soldiers

Ideas for opening blurb:

Welcome to the XCOM Personell Department. Here we maintain the records of extensive aptitude testing and training regimes.

From the sharpshooter with their rifle to the weakling with their smoke grenade, everyone on the assault team has a part to play.

XCOM is an Equal Opportunities Exploiter. Both men and women from any XCOM-funding country are welcome to apply.

-JellyfishGreen

---

We make no distinctions regarding gender or ethnicity (neither do plasma beams). Regardless of how you look you will be turned into blondes the moment the transport lands? -Hobbes 06:12, 17 February 2006 (PST)

---

If your last name sounds English, French, German, Russian, or Japanese, please apply. If not, get lost. -MikeTheRed

Can We Add Page About Squads?

I'm a total Wiki newbie or I'd attempt adding this myself:

I'd like to see a page added that addresses Squad composition for various missions, various transport aircraft, various available technology/equipment, etc. Should everyone be a specialist, should everyone be balanced, or should there be a few specialists and a bunch of balanced soliders, etc? This wouldn't really be a normal "game info" page... more of just a strategy page... perhaps it should be a Field Manual entry? Some things that should be addressed:

The role of HWP's and tradeoff vs. more soldiers. Specialists vs. balanced soldiers -- what kinds of specialists, what makes for a balanced soldier. Best mix of weapons for a squad, as new technology becomes available.

Some unanswered questions on my mind: I'm currently leaning towards two soldier categories: non-combat leaders (loaded with support equipment) and balanced combat soldiers (with a mix of weapons that makes them flexible in combat roles during the mission). I also like the idea of lots of HWP's and uber-soldiers with more equipment.

How to phase in psi-soldiers when you find candidates with high psi-strength? Normally I would want to use them as non-combat leaders, but unfortunately the way promotions work in the game, that doesn't work... the top ranks are filled with morons.

I'm thinking the page on X-COM Squads should heirarchy-wise either be above or below the page on Soldiers... I also think we should rename the "Logistics" section to "X-COM Assets" or something like that... I'm leaning towards the heirarchy going X-COM Assets > Squads > Soldiers > Info/Skills/Combat/etc. I think that would make more sense.

Eric 17:14, 27 July 2006 (PDT)

---

X-Com soldiers are very generic and can change roles on the dime, so it's hard to pigeon hole them into any specific role, but that said, a section on how players can use soldiers is always welcome.

Just as a very quick primer on how you can create a brand new page, just edit the soldier page and create a wiki link to the page you want created. You can do this by surrounding the page name in double square brackets. For example

[[Squad Composition]]

Produces

Squad Composition

Then save your edit. To create the page and put in new content, click on the red link and it'll bring up a blank page. Then edit away and save. You can just dump unformatted text in there and fix it later once you've learned a trick or two - or one of the regulars may meddle with it as they see fit.

As for the heirarchy - I'm on the fence about it. I'd stick to soldiers as the main section for the moment. Until some consensus is obtained on the heirarchy, stick squad composition under the general information section for now.

-NKF

---

I've never seen much point to specific role assignment, although certain stats dictate certain capabilities. A Strength of 40+ is required for a soldier carrying a loaded rocket launcher + 3 heavy rockets; high-tech weapons tend to be lighter. Psi Strength determines who gets a Psi-Amp (they stay off the front line). High Reactions are good for "spotters", such as those posted outside a door. I don't like high reactions for my scouts, because they tend to die -- I reserve soldiers with the crappiest stats for scouting duty (especially the first to walk through a door).

To aid assigning roles like this, renaming soldiers is helpful. I add reactions/FA/str (and later psi str) to their names, and I rename them alphabetically to remember "who's out the door first".

"Fireteams" are an important strategy (groups of 2-4 soldiers), but I group them according to proximity to one another, not stats.

Soldiers vs. HWPs is highly dependent on play style. I like 26 soldiers on an Avenger, personally, although HWPs are excellent expendable scouts. In the early game, money is too tight; I'd rather lose $100k worth of soldiers than $480k worth of tanks. 26 soldiers on an Avenger necessitates Laser Rifles as your primary weapon due to the 80-item limit (no ammo).

A mix of weapons is only necessary in that you should stock a few special-role weapons. I like 2 Rocketeers in the early game, 2 Blasters in the later game. I carry 3+ stun launchers if I'm in the stage of the game where I'm trying to capture an alien leader or commander. If you've got a mix of Heavy Plasmas and Laser Rifles, give the plasma to your most accurate soldiers.

I like to keep the first 6 to 8 soldiers on the Soldier screen off the Skyranger, to be reserved as cannon fodder for later. If my frontmost troops grow very powerful through experience, I can put reserved soldiers in front of them. Deployment is the most dangerous stage of combat.

Try to keep your highest-rank soldiers off the front line.

I guess that's some pretty good advice. I'll create a page for it. ;-)

--Ethereal Cereal 11:13, 29 July 2006 (PDT)

Managing squads

I'd suggest that all useful soldiers are renamed so you can identify them easily. It can even add a bit of fun. I also add a rating for their key stats by appending letters at the end, an R for 50 reactions or S for 35 strength, say. This lets me arm and move soldiers appropriately without knowing everything about them.

When picking a squad for a mission you probably need some expandable scouts, a leader, and some people to carry heavy weapons. It's useful if the front people in the skyranger are expendable as any accidents tend to happen to them. Once you've picked your scouts, hopefully before you've even set off, you should make sure that none of the other soldiers get shot during the mission. I would use low bravery soldiers as expendable scouts. You won't miss people who can go beserk at the first sign of trouble and intentional bravery training is typically an exploit. Soldiers can generally perform all roles except Psi offense, even if some are better skilled than others.

- Egor