Phoenix Point - Hints and Tips?

Pladio

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I've just finished Elex 2 and since Phoenix Point is finally completed, I thought I'd give it a try over the long weekend.
Anyone have hints/tips on what to do or not do ? Especially regarding mission selection.
 
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I'm currently around the middle (I think) of a normal difficulty Phoenix Point campaign, 50-60 hours in. Started it after a news thread here a few weeks ago where @Kordanor highly recommended it. He was right, it's great, better than the new XCOMs for sure. Also the most addictive game I've played in years...

Not sure I have a ton to offer, but one thing worth mentioning upfront is that you may want to consider disabling (or not buying) the Festering Skies DLC your first playthrough. It adds a lot of stuff that can be overwhelming, and that you can't delay dealing with, unlike the stuff from the other DLCs. Personally, I'm not a huge re-player of games, and I wanted the full experience, so I enabled everything. But you can read opinions online about the matter.

If you aren't the type who insists on going in blind, you may want to do a bit of reading on the gameplay/systems before playing. The amount of choices you have, and the amount of things going on, in PP is kind of insane compared to something like the new XCOMs which now feel extremely basic in comparison. Also, I suspect it's much easier to actually lose a campaign in PP - losing felt like a near-impossibility on normal difficulty in the new XCOMs. There are a few decent guides on Steam.
 
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Thanks for this. I prefer going mostly blind except for knowing obvious annoying things. So if there's a mission type which will almost 100% result in my entire game being over, then I'd like to know.

Or if you tell me Festering Skies is really bad then I would disable that.
 
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Here are some basic tips that you might find helpful. It's spoiler free.

I'll be curious to hear what you think about it after you've invested some time. I disagree that it's more fun that XCOM, but hopefully you'll like it more than I did.
 
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Thanks for this. I prefer going mostly blind except for knowing obvious annoying things. So if there's a mission type which will almost 100% result in my entire game being over, then I'd like to know.

Or if you tell me Festering Skies is really bad then I would disable that.
I think the biggest warning would just be that you need to get multiple planes and teams up and running ASAP, otherwise you're going to be quickly overwhelmed by things happening all over the globe. You can build the planes yourself, you can steal them from factions, or you can activate dormant Phoenix bases that happen to have planes sitting around (I think the last option is only available if you have Festering Skies enabled?)

Festering Skies hasn't seemed that bad to me, but before I played, I read a lot of posts where people were warning against enabling it. Some just thought it wasn't good for a first play-through, others thought the game was better in general without it. It adds a whole lot of new stuff to the game, including air battles (which aren't actually that great...)
 
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(I think the last option is only available if you have Festering Skies enabled?)
Yep. However, from what I read, you don't need the extras quite as badly when you don't have FS active. You still want another plane soon to cover more area, but it isn't super critical. (When I played, I started with everything but eventually re-started without FS and one or two others.)

Regarding missions... let's see... bringing a vehicle along for supply missions is a very good idea. Those things have a lot more space than the backs of your characters.
 
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I started playing about 2 weeks ago on Hero difficulty with all DLC enabled it and I am loving it. I find it superior to XCOM2 in many ways but it does have bugs. I'm 90 hours in and I think I am pretty close to the end but I am dragging it out and equipping multiple squads in the best gear and have all the phoenix bases restored with mist repellers in all of them.

The advice I have is:

Keep all the DLC enabled but understand how to manage the unique mechanics that Festering Skies and Corrupted Horizons. It's a very long game and you are probably not going to play it twice.

There is a timed mission called "The Gift" that lasts for 15 days. You will want to leave it till the very last day, by that time you should have a couple of aircraft. That starts Festering Skies. Festering Skies is basically just free resources (if you have sufficent aircraft) so there is no reason to turn it off.

Do not do a mission called "An unexpected emergency". It is what triggers corrupted horizons. There is no timer on it so leave it until you have a two capable squads.

I did both of these as soon as they were available and it did make the early/mid game quite a bit harder than it would of been otherwise.

Warcry (Heavy skill) is one of the best abilities in the game. If you get close to a bunch of enemies and use it you are likely to get no attacks from the entire group of enemies. It even works on Scyalla and turns them into weaklings.

One of the best skills you want your recruits to have is close quarters combat. It gives a bonus to shotguns and melee weapons which happens to be two of the best weapons. Shotguns can kill most enemies with a single shot if you get the positioning right. Phoenix Mercy or the Anu Ironclast is what you want.

The Tier 7 Assault skill is great for clearing the Charons worm spawn. If you are in the middle of them you just pop it and you should be able to kill all 3 worms without using any AP.

Priest is a great support character. You will ideally want some willpower boosting abilities as default skills. If you get your willpower to around 30+ you can mindcontrol a bunch of the most powerful enemies. Their Frenzy ability is also very powerful. Psychic attacks also do a lot of damage if the enemies are concentrated together.

Engineers with the ability that reduces Turret deploy to 1AP can be a game changer. Deploy 3-4 turrets and they will shred the enemy next round if you position them correctly.

If you are really struggling end game then read on...
Melee weapons are devastating if you build your character correctly. It works best with a Assault/Heavy combo. Heavy for the boost to melee damage and Assault for the tier 7 skill that gives 2 AP per kill. If you play the Blood and Steel DLC missions there is a chest augment that reduces melee attacks by 1 AP. Equip the Disciples of Anu Warhammer and endless killing can begin! I think I have killed around 10 Pandorans in a single round with a high speed character. Once you get the ancient weapons it becomes even more OP.
 
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Big fan of PP - but I've yet to play a full game all the way through. I keep getting distracted.

That said, X-Com 2 does the whole research segment of these games particularly well - with a great presentation that makes finding new stuff really compelling.

PP is a bit bland in that way, in comparison.

So, I would say it's not as sexy as X-Com 2 (combat also feels a little sterile) - but, beyond that, it's better in pretty much every way.

Especially in terms of the strategic layer - which is something I really dislike in the modern X-Com games.
 
Here are some basic tips that you might find helpful. It's spoiler free.

I'll be curious to hear what you think about it after you've invested some time. I disagree that it's more fun that XCOM, but hopefully you'll like it more than I did.
So, since you asked :)
I've been playing for quite a while now, but I've got no clue as to when the endgame is so I don't know how far I'm in.

I have mixed feelings about the game. I really like some of the changes over XCOM2 like the aimed attacks, the different body parts with different uses, mutations, cybernetics. There are a lot of fun options to experiment with.

Things I dislike are the majority of the combat maps, which are just samey - except for the Special Missions - the bullet sponge 'bosses' like the Spawnery and the Corrupted nodes, and the weapon armour progression feels very limited.

I feel like if this game had come out a year or two after XCOM2 then I would have enjoyed it more, but now some of the things feel dated.

Overall, I'm still enjoying it and I will likely finish the game at least once, but I am not certain I would ever replay it - in part due to how long it seems to be.
 
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Things I dislike are the majority of the combat maps, which are just samey - except for the Special Missions
That's my #1 complaint personally as well. Not as much map variety as with the new XCOMs.
 
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True, map variety is lacking - and many of them are a little too small for my tastes.

I'm surprised it's so hard to get this right. IIRC the original X-Com (same lead dev) had excellent variety - or that may be my imagination.
 
The map variety didn't bother me much. What killed me off was that the advancement in tech was so smooth that I never felt good about it. I was advancing, but when each improvement is small, it isn't exciting.

Also, the soldiers didn't seem to have much character to them. Only the starting characters really stuck with me, the others were "a sniper/assault" or "a heavy." I didn't have that problem with Long War, which also had a lot of soldiers, but I was able to dress them up and/or mod in interesting voices to make them memorable.
 
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I'm close to the end and the sheer number of haven defence and nest/lair/citadel missions is dragging a bit. I feel like they could of toned down these by 50% to give the player a bit of a break. I think if the player doesn't have some very solid character builds it would just get too overwhelming in terms of how many fights you have to do and how long it takes to clear them.

I think I could finish it in a couple of hours if I wanted to but I want to finish researching ALL the technology.
 
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I played for a few more hours, but I have gotten bored by the game. So I've uninstalled.
It was fun and I thought I would finish it, but it's just too long. I felt a bit the same about Long War for XCOM2.

The game ends up being samey in the end and having to fly around the globe to try and tackle the haven attacks and follow-up Pandoran nests is too much...
I was trying to just whizz through main missions, but each of those distractions started becoming a problem, so I think I'm done.

I doubt I would replay this.
 
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You got way further than I did!
 
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It needs a setting which changes how pandoran bases spawn. It is a bit silly and it seems like there is a minimum i.e. everytime you kill one another will spawn. It should of been like a maximum of 1 nest a week as default with the option of increasing them if you wanted. Taking out a citadel should be something special but it's just more of the same.

edit: although I notice the offical mod does have a setting which changes the frequency of attacks. It would be good if it also had a setting to reduce base spawns themselves.
 
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I got to the point where I was meant to destroy a citadel but it didn't even spawn. I just destroyed two lairs and a nest.
I also destroyed two of those corrupted settlements which felt like a pain too as you couldn't stand close to the node because it would kill everyone, so I had to kill with only two or three units who could see it because it is sat in a building with limited spaces to fire from.

It's like they had so many good ideas but ruined it with some bad design decisions in the end.
 
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I thought those corrupted nodes were pretty easy. You just have your assault guys run in and shoot once and then run back out. It might take 4-5 rounds but it is easy and low risk.

I get you on the bad design though. One thing about the original xcom was that it actually limited how many missions you had to do - which I thought was a great idea - you got plenty of time in the strategic layer. For example, in the original xcom you had 1 alien terror mission and 1 alien research mission in the first month. The second month you had 1 terror and 1 random mission. In the third month you got 2 random missions and 1 terror mission. It was a great design that meant you never felt overloaded. And if you were too busy you didn't even have to investigate a crash site - it was purely optional for bonus resources/points - there was no negative malus.

I think I enjoyed PP more than the both of you but it was certainly a flawed gem for me. It's sad that a few simple tweaks would of made it so much more accessible and enjoyable.
 
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I completely agree it wasn't difficult - just tedious. It's basically a bullet sponge in the truest sense of the word as it does literally nothing if you handle it well.
The only time it did something was in my first try because I didn't know how it attacked.
 
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