User talk:Doomreaver/Invasion

Here is all of the author commentary for this series. I wrote it in parts, so each part has it's own commentary. Feel free to leave comments of your own!

First Contact

Welcome to the XCom Project! I hope you enjoyed the first part. The idea started right after an attempt to run Ironman Classic difficulty where I lost half of my men in the first 3 missions (one in each of the first two, all four I sent in the third), or less then two weeks in game time. It was my own fault, as I made several critical mistakes that I knew better then to make. So I started from scratch and came up with the idea of naming the characters after the TSA and writing about it.

I nearly had a repeat of my last run on the first mission, getting Phil flanked by a Sectoid. Flanking gives ~50% extra chance to hit and crit. At this point in the game, a crit means instant death, and most shots have a base hit and crit chance of 25% or so, meaning Phil had a 1 in 4 chance of not being hit, and if hit only a 1 in 4 chance not to die. The shot missed entirely, and I was very happy that luck was with me for once.

One mission and one kill is enough to get a soldier enough experience to be promoted, so usually the first mission ends with 2 or 3 guys getting their specialization. It wasn't until the end of the mission that I realized Caroline Hardy got the killing blow on all 6 opponents. Sadly, no matter how badass, you can't get a Soldier promoted unless they meet Exp requirement and a certain number of missions completed. So I've got 1 Squaddie with an insane number of kills, and a bunch of Rookies feeling left out. Oh well. /Doomreaver

Girding for War

So this is my first part that is entirely invented by me. This game works on a sort of reverse difficulty, starting out hard when you have Rookie soldiers and no Alien tech. No in game event sparked this section, I just wanted to introduce the in game NPC's, point out how bad your starting position is, and highlight the fact that I was lucky to not lose anyone in the first mission.

Originally the first part mostly took from in game Cinematics to introduce the three NPC's, but then my beta reader pointed out how stilted that made it seem and made me realize it wasn't at all clear that most of them had just arrived. So I rewrote the whole thing, and am much happier with the result.

The second part in the Infirmary really didn't change at all. I picked Phil partially because I hadn't gotten in all the names for my men yet, and partially because it's Phil. In most of his self inserts he's the kind of guy who goes out of his way to check up on and help people, and from the start I had planned on giving him a lot of screen time because everyone knows who he is and I enjoy reading his stuff so much, so it just feels right. /Doomreaver

Midnight Run

This particular part ran across a lot of game mechanics that make little sense in real life. Firstly, it was the middle of the night, but I didn't even realize it until a few real-life days later while I was working on this part due to how bright nighttime is in game so you can see what's going on. Secondly, Vulpintaur got taken to 1 HP from his base HP of 5. Phil then used a medkit on him, and he was back up to 5 HP. Thus the part where he's severely wounded, but the miracle drug gets him back on his feet and he insists on providing cover fire. The game is not so silly as to eliminate recovery time due to medkits, so he'll be out of action for 2 in game weeks.

Phil once again proves his phenomenal luck. An Alien climbed up and around to drop next to him. Fortunately there where boxes between Phil and the Sectoid, so he wasn't flanked this time, but it was still only half cover and an extremely short distance, so it was amazing that he didn't get hit. Directly afterward I ruin it by trying to make him circle around to flank an enemy, only to realize that same ladder the ET used was closer then the long route, causing Phil to run over to it and run up it instead. This made him cross in front of an Alien on Overwatch, which means you fire on the first enemy to move in your field of view. Alas, his luck didn't save him and he got shot. It seems even a Rabbit's run out of luck eventually. /Doomreaver

The Biohazard

There is in fact a bar at XCom. You can see it in game! I decided on the name to it because it has a "Biohazard" sign on the side of the bar. This part took a while to write, because I consulted everyone who donated a character so they could decide their own backstory. Only Phil and Freya's creator took me up on that. Ironically, although it's a multinational organization, most of the characters are probably American due to the source material, so I made a point of specifying at least one foreigner.

Maximilian's backstory came from his eventual nickname "Matchlock", that he'll get if he survives to be promoted a few times. I wanted to connect him with old flintlocks to give a reason for his later nickname. Hawlsera, until this point, wasn't in the list of characters, but I knew from the start I'd want to include her because I really enjoy her writing, a TG soldier would make it feel more TSA, and her origin story occurred to me shortly after I thought to add her. Some of the delay was consultation on the details of modern day Transgender therapy and surgery, then having her read over it all to make sure I made no mistakes. /Doomreaver

Operation Splashdown

The last time I played the game on this difficulty I had a total party wipe on my first UFO mission, meaning all four of my soldiers died horribly. Now I have not only beaten the mission without losing a man, none of my soldiers where even slightly injured. This play through has created interesting conflicting reactions to in game events due to the nature of me writing on everything that happens. One the one hand, going through three missions without losing a man is amazingly lucky, and my goal is to beat the game with as few losses and setbacks as I can. On the other hand I've played up how outgunned and risky the whole thing is, so every time I get through a mission with no deaths and don't lose anyone makes me nervous the project will get boring as I curb stomp the entirety of the game.

This may sound like a broken record, but Phil had an event of insane luck once again. Green had shot and killed one of the first pair of Aliens I spotted, and I decided to move Phil up out of cover and take a shot at the Sectoid from the open. If he succeeded, it'd be dead and he'd be at no risk. Unfortunately, I had already moved him once that turn, so instead he walked out of cover and stood there 10 feet from the enemy in the wide open, basically asking for a horrible death, or at least a painful wound. It missed him. So I moved him up to nearby cover that had previously been just out of reach and took out the target. This is why his luck is commented on in the story, though the in game event didn't translate quite the same. /Doomreaver

Escort Duty

So the other shoe has finally dropped. Hopefully not to many people are totally pissed at me. The first three missions I breezed through with some incredibly lucky breaks, even though I expected someone to get killed at any time. I knew from the start I would lose people, and missions, in this run of the game. It was inevitable on this difficulty, and it sucks, but in the overall terms of the game it's mostly a setback. A bad setback true, I lost my best Soldier and Nigeria is panicked with riots on the streets, but in the grand scheme of things I can still complete the game, and probably even regain Nigeria's confidence. Maybe that's a comfort to Hardy and Morgan, as the fight lives on without them.

The actual events of the mission involved some incredible luck for the Aliens this time. Killing Morgan took a 5 damage shot, when attacks normally do 3-4 damage. Unfortunately the Sectoid not only hit Morgan while he was under cover (a 1 in 5 shot or so) but crit him (a further 1 in 10 chance), instantly killing him. At the end, the final Alien appeared outside of cover and stood in the open in sight of 2 of my soldiers, who both missed an 80% hit chance, then again a pair of misses. This is where I made the worst mistake possible: I got pissed off at the game and stopped thinking, just reacting. As such, I placed Hardy in a bad position to kill the damned thing, and forgot that a medkit can cure the poison. So although I couldn't control what the Aliens did, it is my fault the mission ended in failure, and I will endeavor to do better in the future.

I mentioned this last time, but this play through has given me an interesting duel perspective on the entire game. When I lost the mission, I was furious. But as I finished writing down the events of the mission I was also excited. I knew this was coming, and now it had dropped, all the potential story hooks and plans on how the characters would react started whirling through my head. Actually, I had plans for Morgan and Hardy's future characterization and development, now wasted, but rather then an opportunity lost, I see it as a chance to instead develop the rest of the men more. People who signed up expecting to be cannon fodder and who's characters I haven't made firm plans for now take on greater importance. /Doomreaver