XCOM 2 SQUAAAAAADD

[Jade Harley]

All these squadies, and yet Jade is in none of them... ;n;

[PepsiYuuka]

Not gonna get beaten out by the fairies.

[spoiler]First Name: Yuuka
Nickname: "Youkai Moe"
Surname: Kazami
Gender: F
Nationality: Japanese, obviously.
Backstory/History: "Silence is golden." Her words rang out louder than the shot towards the one that thought it would be a good idea to invade her garden.

Voice: Something smooth, feminine and weeby.
Pose/attitude: Calm.
Preferred Class: Probably either a Ranger or Grenadier. But whatever happens happens.

Facial Shape: Like, whatever you want, dude. In game she's drawn with a pretty round face, but anything's good.
Facial Scars: Again, whatever. She doesn't have any in canon but.
Eye Colour: Red. Edgelord.
Hair Style: Short and kinda wavy. Long with side bangs is also acceptable.
Facial Hair: Nope.
Hair Colour: Green.
Race/skin colour: She's Japanese.
Props: She doesn't have a stupid hat in canon, but if you want to give her a straw hat, that's fine too.
Tattoos: Eh.
Main Armour Colour: Red.
Secondary Armour Colour: White.
Armour Pattern: Plaid.
Preferred Armour Decor: Who needs armor? Not Yuuka.
Weapon Colour: Pale pink, probably.
Weapon Pattern: Regular's fine.
Main Weapon Name: Can I call it "Master Spark"? If not, whatever.

Other Notes: She's definitely a punchy lady. Kill her or throw her at whatever you'd like.[/spoiler]

[Dane Regan]

Updated the list. Also added a few other people and edited Omni's character to have a chicken mask for a helmet.
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I'm probably not going to actually start playing for about 20 hours or so. Maybe longer. I've got D&D for most of tomorrow, and the DLC comes out in about 4 hours time or so (when I'm sleeping). So if you want a chance of being in the initial squad of my game, you've got probably got almost another day to post here.

Also, in regards to character images. I'll post screenshots as you crop up. I can still edit you during the game if there's a problem in the cosmetics department.

[Dane Regan]

Warning: I'll put anything related to the War of the Chosen DLC in spoilers besides general repeatable mission outlines. Story mission stuff and new enemies will be spoilered though. That said, I'm not going to do that for anything in the base game. So if you want what happens in XCOM 2 to be a surprise to you, and you haven't got round to getting/playing it, I would avoid this thread.

I changed my mind and decided to start the game on Legend Ironman (hardest difficulty + no reverting to previous saves), so this'll probably be pretty fatal. I mean, this is already my second attempt at the campaign (I talked about my first a bit in chat, suffered a few team wipes so figured I'd start over because at that point I'd basically lost the game). Also, most mods I'm using are working well with the DLC (they're all cosmetic) besides some of the fancy helmets.

Mission 1: Operation Gatecrasher

Starting out on Mission 1, we have Dawn, Guu, Alex, and Jeff.

The mission mostly goes smoothly. Just, "kill some aliens and blow up a thing" type of thing. Dawn and Guu get set up on a building while Alex and Jeff head in, hiding behind some higher cover and waiting for the moment to strike. Alex throws a grenade dealing good damage to the three alien soldiers in the first group, Guu shoots but misses. Dawn and Jeff both shoot and kill their two targets. Guu's target runs away into the distance, quickly getting out of range.

Alex starts advancing, sees a big group of aliens, decides "nah" and runs back next to Jeff. Guu, Dawn, and Jeff mow down the aliens chasing Alex. Alex gets a kill. The following firefight is mostly an exchange of bullets - the squad being in superior cover and using some grenades to destroy the aliens' cover. The aliens do get a lucky shot on both Guu and Jeff, but there were no fatal wounds. So a pretty good first mission.

Mission photo (I think the dead aliens add to it quite well):
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Dawn gets promoted to Sharpshooter.
Guu gets promoted to Ranger (but is wounded for 17 days).
Jeff gets promoted to Grenadier (but is wounded for 10 days).
Alex gets promoted to Specialist.

Also, Alex and Jeff become best friends after spending most of the mission together and supporting each other.
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Mission 2: 

Again, the squad has to blow up a thing. This time I'm bringing Enel, Victor Wolfe, Dawn, and Alex. Victor gets a flashbang, Alex gets a weapon stock (guaranteed damage of 1 if the main weapon shot misses).

8 turns.

We've got 8 turns to blow up a thing, because if we can succeed in doing so within the set time a chain reaction thing will happen and blow up more stuff. Basically.

Only problem is, it's stupid far away. But luckily we can increase the time we've got by blowing up other stuff along the way. Fun.

First group of enemies is ambushed near flawlessly, Dawn throwing a grenade and everyone else taking shots.

The second group stumbles across the squad while our soldiers were on overwatch, we finish off most of them quickly, but one gets a lucky shot on Dawn.

3 turns left. No more of the things to extend the time, but we're right outside the room with the thing we need to destroy inside. Seems easy enough.

Alex opens the door, everyone manages to kill one of the two grunts, and wound the other, with Dawn staying back, currently unable to get a good angle. The sectoid moved out of sight as soon as it saw us. From the darkness, it moves back into the squad's vision and mindcontrols Victor - Victor happened to be the guy with the flashbang. Flashbangs, when used on an enemy, can stop them mindcontrolling someone. Annoying. The wounded grunt also gets a lucky shot on Alex, but it wasn't lethal.

2 turns left.

Enel moves in and throws a grenade, destroying the sectiod's cover. Alex shoots the sectoid and gets a crit, reducing it to 1 hp. Dawn moves up out of her cover into the only place she had a clear shot. 76% hit chance with her pistol. She takes it. Boom! Headshot! Victor recovers from mind control and easily kills the last grunt. 

1 turn left.

We place the bombs, take a photo, and leave.
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[/spoiler]

Dawn is promoted to rank of Corporal, and becomes a hardscope pro. She's wounded for 15 days. She also develops a negative trait and becomes overly aggressive, meaning she will sometime take shots immediately instead of going on overwatch.
Enel is promoted to Specialist.
Victor is promoted to Grenadier.
Alex is promoted to the rank of Corporal, and can now use his drone to heal people. He's wounded for 12 days.d

We also get an engineer, which is great. Said engineer is Boris Johnson.

---

Next time...

We make contact with some other resistance groups. This is all fancy new stuff, so my next post will be in spoilers, probably. Or most of it will be. To see who's in currently in the barracks, see the now edited post near the top of the thread. As I said in the top posts, I can still add new people to the pool while the game is in progress, and you could crop up. So post here with the characters you want to add if you feel like sacrificing yourself killing aliens.

[Handsome Jack]

Jeff and Alex becoming best friends over killing aliens is exactly how we became friends in real life.

[Dane Regan]

Warning: May contain spoilers. Although admittedly this mission is mostly in the trailer.

Mission 3: Operation Lost and Abandoned
[spoiler]
We've got to make contact with two resistance groups. Sadly, they both hate each other. In an effort to get them to work together, we're sending some soldiers to meet up with a representative from each and bring them to neutral ground.

Clownpiece and Summer are sent to meet up with Elena "Outrider" Dragunova [story character, sort of - I reckon I'll keep them], a Reaper. Their part of the mission goes flawlessly despite having to travel through a city infested with The Lost (basically zombies). Summer kills about 10 overall in this section, never missing a shot. Clownpiece got about 8. The pair worked together so well that Dragunova didn't need to break out of concealment.

Enel (armed with Alex's weapon - the one with the stock, and a flashbang instead of a normal grenade) and Victor (who gets expanded magazines so has more ammo in his big gun) are sent to meet up with Pratal Mox [story character, sort of - I reckon I'll keep them], a Skirmisher. However, after travelling a short distance to the meetup point, they run into a small group of alien soldiers. The squad kills them easily, however upon moving further they notice the way to the rendezvous is blocked by almost a full alien army, these aliens intending to kill the lost. Mox, seeing this, fires a calculated shot resulting in a big gas tank exploding and killing a lot of aliens as well as blocking them off from us [scripted cutsceen]. Annoyingly, the noise caused a lot of Lost to start swarming the area, forcing the squad to try and hold their position while Central worked to find an alternative route. It was close, but no one got hurt. 

After a bit of arguing, and the appearance of a common foe - an Assassin - Mox and Elena agree to work together [scripted cutscene]. The Assassin alien thing fades back into the shadows, then comes back in out of nowhere, slices Victor across the almost killing him, then runs away hiding under the bridge. Clownpiece and Mox jump down, and start firing from a flanking position. Enel helps Victor to his feet then jumps down and throws his flashbang. Summer jumps down, takes a shot, it's a crit. From this the Assassin flees, teleporting away before Elena can get a shot in. However, they set off some strange frequency that lures in all The Lost from across the whole city. More and more and more start swarming in from all directions. Elena takes some shots (still at the top of the bridge) before running to catch up with the group. Movement is slow, and Victor is still wounded, but it's the best we can do. It's hard to run quickly when you're also trying to make sure a running swarm of zombies don't get near you. Especially when they're in all directions. Luckily, they're pretty weak [the action points for any killing shot are refunded] but there are a lot of them.

A large swarm pushes through the middle of the group, leaving Clownpiece physically separated. Clownpiece has to run the other way, around the side, to avoid the zombies. She climbs up a ladder to the (luckily empty) top floor of a building and keeps shooting everything chasing her. Everyone else makes it to the evac point while she's doing this. But I refuse to leave anyone behind. So, Summer and Elena move out and fight their way back to get shots to try and free her up so she can run back. Clownpiece moves inside the building and throws a grenade behind her to destroy the ladder so the zombies can't chase her further, and jumps down on the other side, running through the gaps created and just making it to the evac.

Because the Assassin is broken af, they reteleport in (or maybe they were already there and just invisible, idk) and grab Mox from behind, capturing him [scripted]. Everyone else makes it out alive. Sadly, there isn't the option to take any mission photos.

Elena "Outrider" Dragunova is promoted to the rank of Corporal. She can now make lots of stuff explode while staying hidden, which is cool.
Enel is promoted to the rank of Corporal. His drone can now zap people. He is also very shaken, so needs some time to rest otherwise he can't operate at full effectiveness.
Victor Wolfe promoted to the rank of Corporal. He can now shred armour with his big gun. He's wounded for 46 days though.
Summer Murdoch is promoted to Sharpshooter (unsurprising because of his somewhat amazing hitrate - hitting 8 65-67% shots in a row is like a 2 to 3% chance, ish).
"Hellfairy" Clownpiece is promoted to Ranger.
[/spoiler]
Photo of everyone (taken generally, not as a mission photo):
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---

Next time...

Alex, Jeff, Guu, and Dragunova work together to try and defend a civilian at a resistance centre.

Also, my Guerilla Warfare Facility is almost built, so soon I'll be able to choose what classes to promote people to, instead of them being allocated randomly.

[Omni]

In my game, Boris Johnson and the rest of the politicians only appear as Dark VIPs, lol. I wanted the experience of killing David Cameron. If you're reading this, government, it was a joke.

[Dane Regan]

Sometimes they appear as civies in terror missions for me. Othertimes I end up with Donald Trump as an engineer.

I'm like 15 missions ahead of this thread because I went on a big spree. But I've got mission photos and notes about what happened and stuff (so I'll probs update this weekend).

Also, The Warlock chosen is actually the biggest load of BS. At least on Legend difficulty. And using Face Off against 23 Lost at once is the most satisfying thing.

[Dane Regan]

I did a lot of playing in one go. So I'm mostly going to skim over these missions. Also, I updated the top post to say who's in the squad and added some stats for the Sgt.+ ranked people. It's worth noting that people like Summer who have a stupidly high number of kills went on more missions with The Lost (basically zombies). Whereas Dawn, who has less, has only been on usual missions against normal aliens. Also, I'm not going to really mention promotions outside of key milestones. In this case, that's sergeant (because the game auto-generates a photo when that happens, although I could manually make one if I wanted for any promotion).

Another thing to note: Legend difficulty is hard. Especially on Ironman.

Mission 4:
Guu, Dragunova, Alex and Jeff are sent to defend a resistance haven. I would write you a story, but in this case, it's simpler to say it went flawlessly:
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Photo:
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Mission 5:
Dawn, Clownpiece, Elena, and Enel infiltrate an ADVENT (alien) facility to take some supplies we need. Furthermore, the area was loaded with explosives and cars and such across the whole map (things we didn't need). I brought Elena since I knew about the explosives before the mission, and she has a skill that allows her to shoot vehicles and explosives with high accuracy to detonate them. She dominated this, with everyone else barely scoring any kills. As before, the result:
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Photo (I'm quite happy with the background I found):
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As a result of this mission, Elena and Enel are both promoted to Sergeant:
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Mission 6:
Guu, Elena, and Alex go to an alien facility hoping to free Mox from captivity. Only 3 soldiers go since stealth is required. The result:
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Photo (I'm beginning to notice a pattern with Guu and Elena's positioning):
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Somewhat unsurprisingly, after the mission, Guu and Elena become pretty good friends.
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Mission 7:
Jeff, Summer, Alex, Mox, and Elena (I got a squad size upgrade) go into an area infested with both aliens and the zombie things to try and get some supplies. I took a few risks to get them. Also, the Chosen Assassin appeared. There was a slightly comical result as Alex threw a lure towards said Assassin. The zombies ended up surrounding her and allowing the squad to finish her off easily, killing her off for a short time. Alex got the final shot. The result:
[spoiler]
Mox, Summer, and Jeff were wounded. But damn. Summer seriously carried, killing about 9 zombies in one turn by himself with his pistol (they were all swarming him) and managing to secure quite a lot of supplies. Elena stayed stealthy most of the time and also flanked round taking the rest.
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Photo:
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Mission 8:
It was an interesting mission. Guu, Chara, Dawn, Alex, and Clownpiece ventured into some underground tunnels to save a VIP. They had to hold the area for a while, and a lot of aliens dropped in at once. More than it was possible for the squad to kill even if they landed every shot. As a result, everyone was wounded, at least lightly. Chara critically so. Still, everyone came out alive. I consider that a win.

Photo:
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Also, Clownpiece and Dawn got promoted to Sergeant:
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Mission 9:
Summer, Guu, Enel, Jeff, and Goku work together to protect an important transmitter device. I'm not going to describe the result because it's fairly obvious by the background of the photo:
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We got two promotions to Sergeant, Jeff and Guu:
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Goku and Enel become pretty good friends after that mission:
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Mission 10:
Guu, Enel, Elena, Clownpiece, and Summer work together to protect a new resistance outpost. It started off easy enough, with the squad easily dispatching of a small group of enemies. Then "The Warlock" another member of "The Chosen", the select few super strong alien people, appeared. He mostly left the group alone as they scouted about trying to save as many civilians as possible. However, every few turns he set an annoying minion towards us, teleporting it in. Naturally, with it being right in front of Clownpiece's face, she shot it. It exploded. She got hurt. Guu panicked and moved to immediately try to fire on another alien, instantly killing it. Clownpiece's cover was also destroyed, so Enel used his drone to generate a small shield around her.

From here, I moved Elena to try and save one of the last civilians, however upon going too near to The Warlock, she was instantly revealed from her concealment. With Summer being the only person with his move remaining, he had to move into a better position for his sniper rifle, as he was too far back to help.

Elena Dragunova got mind-controlled by a Sectoid. No one had a clear shot on it, and while Summer had a flashbang he was still too far back to use it on the alien. So instead he used it on Elena to stop her hurting the squad too much. Everyone else cleared up all the nearby aliens they could.

Elena, while mind controlled, shot the last unsaved civilian. The Sectoid then resurrected that civilian as a zombie. Summer and Clownpiece took potshots at the Sectoid. Enel then moved to get the Sectoid in his line of sight, and used his drone to finish it off. People were mostly wounded, but Guu, Enel, and Clownpiece had medkits. All that remained was The Warlock.

Moving ahead slightly, Elena got a line of sight. The Warlock saw her, and closed in on the group, summoning a grunt to help him. I moved everyone into position, with Guu killing the grunt with a somewhat lucky shot and Clownpiece going on overwatch. Everyone was hunkered down or in good cover so I was feeling safe.

He then mind-controlled Clownpiece. Clownpiece was on overwatch and right next to the whole group. The enemy was in good cover, and the squad had no way to flank him or destroy the cover. There was no way anyone would be able to break the mind-control. And, since Clownpiece was on overwatch and right next to Summer, Enel, and Guu, if either of them moved they would instantly die, or at least had a very low chance of survival. They had upgraded shotguns (Guu and Clown benefited) but didn't have better armour yet.

I really did consider this:
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[/spoiler]
But instead, the squad took the only option I could think of to save Clownpiece.

I set up an evac point further forward, as close to The Warlock as I could get it so that everyone could still reach it in one move point.

Further from Clownpiece, Elena ran as far as she could away from both her, the Warlock, and the Evac point. This drew Clownpiece's shot. If it hit, Elena would have died. After that, everyone besides Clown and Elena moved onto the evac point and fired their shots at the Warlock. Enel's hit, which was good. Everyone else's missed. From there, Enel, Summer, and Guu evac'd.

Clownpiece, while mind-controlled, ran towards Elena, but Elena was too far for her to get a good shot in her turn. The same happened for the Warlock. Elena ran away again and again and again. The same thing occurred, the enemies just chased her until...

The mind-control wore off. Clownpiece shot the Warlock in the back. And luckily he was right next to a vehicle (I had been attempting to make them chase her near one). One Elena could detonate, which killed him. At least temporarily.

Mission result:
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Elena Carried:
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Photo:
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Summer also got promoted to Sergeant:
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Mission 11:
This mission was mostly a "go in and kill the things" type of thing. So Dawn, Guu, Elena, Jeff, and Harry Dresden went to kill the things. Elena's "I can make cars do big explosions" perk carried this. Dawn and Jeff did get wounded though. And when the squad started to get pinned down after killing some of the things, Harry and Guu got some lucky shots that really helped.

Photo:
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Mission 12:
Clownpiece, Victor, Elena, Guu, and Mox go on a supply raid. It goes fairly smoothly, but Guu does take a small hit.

Photo:
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Mox is also promoted to Sergeant:
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Mission 13:
Jeff, Clownpiece, Mox, Alex, and Elena go to escort an important engineer back to The Avenger (XCOM's base). It goes fairly smoothly, but Alex takes a small hit.

Photo:
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Mission 14:
Enel, Summer, Elena, Clownpiece, and "Scorch" (the Templar) go on a fun zombie slaying mission while also hacking some things. Assassin shows up again, but as before the squad use lures to manipulate the zombies to attack her. She does, however, do heavy damage to Enel, and "Scorch" and Elena take some light damage from Zombies. Elena gets the finishing shot on her.

Photo:
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Mission 15:
Jeff, Mox, Alex, Dane, and Harry go to kill the aliens that are attacking a Resistance Haven to protect the civilians. The result:
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Photo:
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Mission 16:
"Scorch", Dawn, Alex, Goku, and Enel go on a mission together to assassinate a key alien commander. "Scorch" and Goku both take some wounds, but besides that, it goes pretty well. Still no soldier deaths. Some of these missions were more stressful than I'm likely leading you to believe though.

Photo:
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Mission 17:
I don't think this needs much more description than "we're saving an important dude and their bodyguard who got pinned down by a horde of The Lost". I'll let this:
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And the photo (Enel, Dawn, Summer, Guu, Harry, the bodyguard of the VIP):
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Do the talking.

Also, Harry got his promotion to Sergeant:
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---

Aaaand that's all I've got so far. Notably, the new grenadier wasn't an OV character. Nor were they a story character. So she's up for grabs as a quick way into the XCOM squad if anyone isn't in the list of characters new the top of the post and wants to join. I can customise them fully to fit your character as needed.

The character post near the top is updated with fresh info. Although I'm only really tracking soldiers of Sgt. rank or higher. If you want me to change your character a bit and think they're a tad off from what you saw from the photos, tell me and I'll do what I can.

[Blink]

I'm about to take on the Assassin Stronghold! On my first playthrough of the expansion.

[Simon]

You haven't put Dante on the squad yet, after all this time? Damn.

[Ebonywood Hellscythe]

@Dante: I've been looking for him. As soon as I see him pop up on the recruitment list I'll add him. I've been trying to give people who posted here priority.

@Blink: I still need a Major. I'll get there eventually but promotions take a long time to get on Legend. Which makes sense since there's more aliens each mission and all the construction and scanning times are slowed down.

The Warlock dude is by far the worst imo. Just make sure you have a conceal Reaper for when you take on the Assassin. That way you can scout ahead and keep an eye on her. Apparently I actually got quite unlucky in my game, and The Warlock doesn't always have the thing that removes people from concealment.

I haven't seen Hunter yet though. But my guess is that he's like a super annoying sniper.

[Dane Regan]

Ffs. Clownpiece got mind-controlled again. >_>

I swear...

*cracks knuckles*

Time to kill a Warlock.

[Blink]

The Warlock dude is by far the worst imo. Just make sure you have a conceal Reaper for when you take on the Assassin. That way you can scout ahead and keep an eye on her. Apparently I actually got quite unlucky in my game, and The Warlock doesn't always have the thing that removes people from concealment.

For the Assassin, I utilized Scanning Protocol from the Specialist a lot. Plus the scanning utility item.

[Ebonywood Hellscythe]

@Blink: Nah. Scanning is a waste of an item slot. I'd rather bring a vest or ammo. For specialists it can be a nice skill though, especially considering you can double back and still get the other.

Reapers are basically portable battle scanners. Once they've got the abilities to help them stay hidden, you can use them to easily kill anything that survives on lowish health with their stupid high aim.

[Ebonywood Hellscythe]

@Blink: Wait, sorry. I take some of that back. Scanning protocol and battle scanners are still useful. Namely for Chryssalids. Because they hide and burrow into the ground where you can't see them.

But until you start seeing them, scanning protocol is good enough usually.

[Dane Regan]

Something tells me this is gonna suck... At least no one is wounded though, so all the best dudes are ready to go.
[spoiler]
And if I fail, this is all going to be over. Literally just built (and upgraded) a Defense Matrix though. And put an engineer there.


[/spoiler]