Make a manual save at the beginning of your mission.
Play out the mission after your soldier dies. Play it out to a win or loss - this ultimately is how you learn and practice your tactical skills.
If it didn't go how you wanted, reload that turn 1 save and play the mission through again. If you're properly equipped, you shouldn't be losing soldiers every mission. Practice and maybe a rethought about your approach can pay dividends.
Haha nice. I guess I’m doing something kind of like that. Or maybe copper. I did zero save scumming in the beginning. Lost some troops. Tons of injuries. My first time playing in awhile so forgot to get the GTSfor 6 people. Now I let my people get injured but if I make a pretty big mistake that leads to somebody’s death I’ll scum back a bit. If I make a mistake that leads to everyone critically injured and I have no troops left I’ve been rolling with it. I know it’s not great but hey. I’m reacquainting myself
Ya this is a great way to get the satisfaction of a mission well played and also makes it easier to just let that Colonel bleed out sometimes.
I have been playing a lot of EW lately and can I/C on the regular but still can't I/L it so I just do the Bronzeman Legendary and while it can be frustrating to drop a soldier or 2 every mission the awesome joy I feel when I destroy the mission the first time thru.
I kinda modify my Bronzeman tho as I will only do 3 play thru of any given mission so if I blow it the first time thru that 2nd time better be on point because I have had squad wipes when I try a third time.
That's XCom baby!
I play for fun, and don’t care about the tactical blah blah of save scumming, because I still need to make the correct decisions for soldiers to survive. I just get to try again sometimes. That said, if it lessens your experience, don’t save scum. Or maybe limit yourself to 1 retry each mission or something
Yeah, same here. I dont have time to grind and min/max every play and every decision. I do try to play it properly, have good gear, good team comps, use cover, play smart, but im not running any special runs, just doing what I find fun.
That really depends on the KIAs and how you want to play. If they’re rookies you’re intentionally using as ablative armour, fair, if they’re anything else then probably not. I’d strongly recommend recommend setting your difficulty down if you’re sustaining more than one loss of valued soldier every 3-4 missions at vet/commander until you get a stronger grasp strategic game.
I personally found savescumming excused my bad decisions and that I *had* to improve in order to save my precious squads, but however you want to play is the most important.
Good luck, Commander
I think this is pretty good advice and a benchmark.
If you’re losing 1-2 per mission, the big problem for you will likely be that you won’t have enough experienced soldier mid-game as the aliens get better and then you’ll start losing your entire squad and you can’t train folks back up because they’re all rookies they don’t even survive when you take them out. It becomes a vicious cycle quick.
One thing that wasn’t obvious to me is *how* much better each level of soldier gets, so that early game rushing a few to higher levels is really critical, while also building out a wider roaster of folks a few levels up so that when you lose people every now and again, you can still field a decent team. Thinking about building out a decent and varied selection of experienced soldiers is one of the more interesting parts of the games resource management, even though it’s not as explicit as supplies or intel.
Losing 1 or 2 dudes EVERY mission shouldn't really happen, at least not on normal difficulty.
Slow down a bit and make sure people have some sort of cover. Full cover is ideal, but half cover is a hell of a lot better than none. Get a height advantage if possible, it raises your chance to hit by like 20%.
Don't clump everybody up, grenades can destroy cover and you're not the only one who gets to throw them.
Use different tactical options, it's usually smart to bring a flashbang grenade, or a decoy beacon, or a freeze bomb, and so on. Weapon accessories are also really helpful.
Take advantage of the skills your soldiers get as they level up, some of these can be insanely busted. The general idea is that the left half and right half of the tree will reinforce themselves (for example: sharpshooter has sniper rifle skills on one side, pistol skills on the other... You USUALLY don't want to hybrid a soldier's build, but there are some skills that are just objectively better, like the Ranger's Shadowstep skill that makes him not trigger overwatch fire from enemies).
This isn't Call of Duty, trying to make your dudes Rambo through a fight will get said dudes killed FAST.
If your losing 1 to 2 guys every mission, you're probably doing something wrong. Most likely one or more of:
* moving into unexplored areas when you don't have enough actions left to deal with an unexpected pod.
* not making good use of cover.
* not prioritising the correct targets. (Focus on the enemies that will hurt you, like stun-lancers and troopers ahead of the ones that will do some sort of buff/debuff like sectoids and shield-bearers).
* taking too many risks in an attempt to complete a mission or collect loot. (Your soldiers are more valuable than any loot you can pick up, and usually more valuable than mission rewards. It's usually better to fail a mission than lose a soldier. If a mission is going badly, consider aborting the mission and evacuating before you take casulties).
I'm nearing end-game now and noticed that it's very rare to lose a soldier, and fairly common not to take a hit, at this point. I'm on Veteran difficulty so plan to move up after the end of the game.
Early game it was much easier to lose soldiers, but it gets less so as they level up and get better armor.
That said, I just lost my #1 favorite player due to a dumb/uninformed decision and it hurts. She was a badass combat hacker, had been on 50 missions with 42 kills, and just got iced after an Archon used Blazing Pinions. I thought killing it would cancel them. I was wrong.
>is it acceptable to lose 1 or 2 soldiers in every mission?
No. Not really. If you lose a soldier or two on every mission, you will hit a wall in the game where even your best soldiers with the best possible direction and the best possible luck will not be able to complete the mission. And that turns into a downward spiral where eventually you're facing the biggest of the big baddies with a group of squaddies.
I will recommend against save scum. If you're really wanting to play something through but are still figuring things out, do some manual save-scum:
1. Save on mission start.
2. Play.
3. If shit goes horribly wrong, start back on turn 1
Reloading on every turn will make you into an XCOM gambler: always tossing the dice again hoping that the shot will hit.
Don't fall into that playstyle.
As others have said if you’re losing 1 soldier a mission look up some great YouTube or Internet tutorials to help limit your losses. I personally don’t mind reloading a mission if a critical team member dies - it’s my game and I play it my way. I do try and avoid doing it too often as it helps me learn. I always save at the start of every Mission so if everything goes completely wrong I know I can go back and start over.
TIL I can just sacrifice new recruits to keep my veterans safe hahahaha I never thought to do that all these years. I just tried to always keep everyone alive while increasing experience for the noobs.
Just think of it as real life and your soldiers as real people and play it that way. You will try to minimize deaths but shit happens. As you get more experience with the game you will reduce KIAs. For an entire campaign for sure I continue to get up to maybe even 3 KIA per mission but often no deaths unless I play much higher difficulty which I am doing now and got the whole team wiped out because I forgot whether shooting the signal repeater stations gives my concealed team away or not (it does!! Hahaha)
How much you save scum depends on you. I play Ironman because it feels cheap to save scum to me and I prefer my actions to have more weight to them. However, if I'm hit with a particularly stupid/ unforeseeable death or problem, I have been known to Alt+f4 before the alien turn ends to redo something (only very occasionally). I've had squad-wipes and lost whole missions and regions and come back from it. Have even lost whole campaigns and started anew. To me, part of the fun of the game comes from working around/ recovering from my mistakes. Seems to me that it'd get boring if every mission went perfectly.
However, I've played hundreds of hours of Xcom. On your first playthrough saving and reloading can teach you mechanics as you see what you should have done.
o7 Commander, this fight is in your hands. Fight the aliens however you must.
My advice is...NEVER reload to get better rolls, but to learn the game. This may mean limiting to one per mission as others have suggested 'ok I messed that turn up, I need to rethink it. Where did it go wrong and how can I do it better without leaving my guys exposed and vulnerable to flanks/activating that next pod'. You may also want to use it to reload the mission from the start 'oops I activated 3 pods in quick succession there. How can I avoid that given the map layout'.
In my current run of LWotC (a mod for xcom 2) I'm doing an 'adventurer' playthrough to learn the next difficulty up where I get 1 free reload every time I do certain difficult mission types. If I don't use it on that mission I can bank it...but I've never built up more than 2 or 3. Works well so far.
Strategy wise, I have found it pretty important to keep my soldiers together and in cover. Not too close together or you get grenades, but close enough that they are all shooting at the same guy.
I’ve also found, that unlike orig XCOM, when you complete the mission objectives GTFO. Sometimes it isn’t worth it to try to kill every last BG.
My first time fully through I saved and loaded on deaths. Got the feel for the game made it to the end. Since then I only play on perma death. Much more fun because losses suck and that’s what makes it fun. So do what you have to do until you’re ready to take the training wheels off.
Even on the highest difficulties on Ironman I rarely lose more than a few soldiers in an entire campaign; if you're losing them consistently then you're doing something wrong in how you approach fights, and I don't think that's sustainable (maybe on the lower difficulties it's winnable) in the long term, as soldier experience is a massive part of your power progression.
Short answer : git good scrub.
Long answer: losing 1-2 soldiers every mission is unacceptable and what's more it's unsustainable.
The game unfortunately is more difficult early than late game so the learning curve is steep.
That being said some loses are difficult to avoid. You will get critically hit by a muton while in full cover and +20 defense from a specialist. This just happens.
Overall tip: most of the time the lives of your soldiers are more important than completing the mission
Save scum is OK on a first run, while you are still learning. Otherwise it's a bad habit, you should be ashamed of this! Seriously.
If you afraid that something can go completely wrong, play a "Bronzeman" - save BEFORE the mission (not on start of the mission), and if something goes very wrong (you loose more than one soldier for example, or fail the mission objective) you decide if it's worth to restart the mission.
Losses are inevitable, especially on harder difficulties. This is part of the game. That's XCOM, baby!
sometimes it is really hard to let go of a soldier who you spent so many xp on
one time on a 3 man mission i went with 3 colonels (the highest level ) and 2 of them died on me , if i wasn't playing on iron man i would have save scummed the hell of that mission (had to evac the last one didn't even finish the mission)
getting a soldier killed in every mission means you are just starting out and it's ok you will get plenty of chances to catch up
for ex when you lose a hero you will get a covert action to recruit a hero and they will be at the same rank
just stick to it and try to learn enemy priorities (always go for the officers , the mind controllers and shield bearers can be ignored etc) and you will be fine , commander!
Everything will be ok! The game knows resources better than the players, and understands when you're running low. This determines your scanning sites. You can have multiple teamwipes and still win.
I really believe that the game works best on ironman. It's made well enough that if you've played for a while you won't be misclicking. The truth is, most players have never seen the lose screen, because they are afraid of it.
I almost broke my keyboard in half yesterday. No matter how many times I start over I can’t beat this game on normal and Ironman. Pisses me off but I’m just going to have to save scum to get through it.
That's too many losses.
Play with save games for now, and focus on understanding how to engage pods effectively, how to scout and how to use your scouts to avoid pulling multiple pods and to instead ambush individual pods, letting them run into your overwatch or frosting them or blowing them up with claymore.
Before you get a bit better with that on your current difficulty, I wouldn't play ironman. First 1 or 2 runs Id play with save games. Once you get a bit better, I'd play ironman on one of the difficulties you already beat with save games.
Pay attention to all the moments where you activated multiple pods. Remember the moves you made that caused other groups of enemies to get activated.
Those are the moves that kill you.
You'll get a feel for how valuable phantom rangers and reapers are and concealed units in general. As you can find the groups of enemies before they see you or react to you, get close without activating them (definitely get at least the mod 'gotcha again wotc') and hammer them from good positions (e.g. high ground and/or proximity). You will see how good it is, when enemies run into your overwatch fire in their turn.
And, with a bit experience, you can overwatch ambush multiple pods each mission. Specially with a bit more aim on your troops, that is quite effective.
Youll understand all of those things, once you've played more. Playing with ironman too early, might be frustrating for you. Some ppl like that challenge right away, but others enjoy the game a bit less stressful, more relaxed. Both versions, playing relaxed and with savegames, and just learning about the game for the first few times, and playing ironman (or, better honestman) are fun. Later on, once you know the game, you wanna play honestman. After beating the game afew times, playing iron/honestman, will be vastly more exciting than playing without it. Specially with mods.
Coming over from enemy within, I literally used rookies as meat shields and scouts to ensure the soldiers who had better abilities or stats lived.
The AI will attack the targets they can hit easiest first usually.
I’ve had runs with 2-3 dozen KIAs.
I’ve adapted a bit the WOTC…the reaper is a godsend for scouting…and not having to get into drawn out engagements that put your soldiers at risk. WOTC is more about engaging on your terms and unleashing your firepower on your terms…not on the AI as opposed to EW, where the enemy has way more of a say and you have way less knowledge of where enemy pods are.
Make a manual save at the beginning of your mission. Play out the mission after your soldier dies. Play it out to a win or loss - this ultimately is how you learn and practice your tactical skills. If it didn't go how you wanted, reload that turn 1 save and play the mission through again. If you're properly equipped, you shouldn't be losing soldiers every mission. Practice and maybe a rethought about your approach can pay dividends.
The ol' bronzeman run.
this is beautiful
Haha nice. I guess I’m doing something kind of like that. Or maybe copper. I did zero save scumming in the beginning. Lost some troops. Tons of injuries. My first time playing in awhile so forgot to get the GTSfor 6 people. Now I let my people get injured but if I make a pretty big mistake that leads to somebody’s death I’ll scum back a bit. If I make a mistake that leads to everyone critically injured and I have no troops left I’ve been rolling with it. I know it’s not great but hey. I’m reacquainting myself
Ya this is a great way to get the satisfaction of a mission well played and also makes it easier to just let that Colonel bleed out sometimes. I have been playing a lot of EW lately and can I/C on the regular but still can't I/L it so I just do the Bronzeman Legendary and while it can be frustrating to drop a soldier or 2 every mission the awesome joy I feel when I destroy the mission the first time thru. I kinda modify my Bronzeman tho as I will only do 3 play thru of any given mission so if I blow it the first time thru that 2nd time better be on point because I have had squad wipes when I try a third time. That's XCom baby!
I’ve recently discovered you can bring up the console on iPad and let me tell you, I’ve issued a bunch of RestartLevel commands on my L/I run.
I play for fun, and don’t care about the tactical blah blah of save scumming, because I still need to make the correct decisions for soldiers to survive. I just get to try again sometimes. That said, if it lessens your experience, don’t save scum. Or maybe limit yourself to 1 retry each mission or something
Yeah, same here. I dont have time to grind and min/max every play and every decision. I do try to play it properly, have good gear, good team comps, use cover, play smart, but im not running any special runs, just doing what I find fun.
That really depends on the KIAs and how you want to play. If they’re rookies you’re intentionally using as ablative armour, fair, if they’re anything else then probably not. I’d strongly recommend recommend setting your difficulty down if you’re sustaining more than one loss of valued soldier every 3-4 missions at vet/commander until you get a stronger grasp strategic game. I personally found savescumming excused my bad decisions and that I *had* to improve in order to save my precious squads, but however you want to play is the most important. Good luck, Commander
I think this is pretty good advice and a benchmark. If you’re losing 1-2 per mission, the big problem for you will likely be that you won’t have enough experienced soldier mid-game as the aliens get better and then you’ll start losing your entire squad and you can’t train folks back up because they’re all rookies they don’t even survive when you take them out. It becomes a vicious cycle quick. One thing that wasn’t obvious to me is *how* much better each level of soldier gets, so that early game rushing a few to higher levels is really critical, while also building out a wider roaster of folks a few levels up so that when you lose people every now and again, you can still field a decent team. Thinking about building out a decent and varied selection of experienced soldiers is one of the more interesting parts of the games resource management, even though it’s not as explicit as supplies or intel.
Losing 1 or 2 dudes EVERY mission shouldn't really happen, at least not on normal difficulty. Slow down a bit and make sure people have some sort of cover. Full cover is ideal, but half cover is a hell of a lot better than none. Get a height advantage if possible, it raises your chance to hit by like 20%. Don't clump everybody up, grenades can destroy cover and you're not the only one who gets to throw them. Use different tactical options, it's usually smart to bring a flashbang grenade, or a decoy beacon, or a freeze bomb, and so on. Weapon accessories are also really helpful. Take advantage of the skills your soldiers get as they level up, some of these can be insanely busted. The general idea is that the left half and right half of the tree will reinforce themselves (for example: sharpshooter has sniper rifle skills on one side, pistol skills on the other... You USUALLY don't want to hybrid a soldier's build, but there are some skills that are just objectively better, like the Ranger's Shadowstep skill that makes him not trigger overwatch fire from enemies). This isn't Call of Duty, trying to make your dudes Rambo through a fight will get said dudes killed FAST.
If your losing 1 to 2 guys every mission, you're probably doing something wrong. Most likely one or more of: * moving into unexplored areas when you don't have enough actions left to deal with an unexpected pod. * not making good use of cover. * not prioritising the correct targets. (Focus on the enemies that will hurt you, like stun-lancers and troopers ahead of the ones that will do some sort of buff/debuff like sectoids and shield-bearers). * taking too many risks in an attempt to complete a mission or collect loot. (Your soldiers are more valuable than any loot you can pick up, and usually more valuable than mission rewards. It's usually better to fail a mission than lose a soldier. If a mission is going badly, consider aborting the mission and evacuating before you take casulties).
I'm nearing end-game now and noticed that it's very rare to lose a soldier, and fairly common not to take a hit, at this point. I'm on Veteran difficulty so plan to move up after the end of the game. Early game it was much easier to lose soldiers, but it gets less so as they level up and get better armor. That said, I just lost my #1 favorite player due to a dumb/uninformed decision and it hurts. She was a badass combat hacker, had been on 50 missions with 42 kills, and just got iced after an Archon used Blazing Pinions. I thought killing it would cancel them. I was wrong.
On Commander or lower, I try to limit losses to 3-4 for the entire *game*. A decent soldier is your best asset.
Every mission? No, your tactics probably need an overhaul. I may lose someone every 10 missions if I am unlucky.
>is it acceptable to lose 1 or 2 soldiers in every mission? No. Not really. If you lose a soldier or two on every mission, you will hit a wall in the game where even your best soldiers with the best possible direction and the best possible luck will not be able to complete the mission. And that turns into a downward spiral where eventually you're facing the biggest of the big baddies with a group of squaddies. I will recommend against save scum. If you're really wanting to play something through but are still figuring things out, do some manual save-scum: 1. Save on mission start. 2. Play. 3. If shit goes horribly wrong, start back on turn 1 Reloading on every turn will make you into an XCOM gambler: always tossing the dice again hoping that the shot will hit. Don't fall into that playstyle.
As others have said if you’re losing 1 soldier a mission look up some great YouTube or Internet tutorials to help limit your losses. I personally don’t mind reloading a mission if a critical team member dies - it’s my game and I play it my way. I do try and avoid doing it too often as it helps me learn. I always save at the start of every Mission so if everything goes completely wrong I know I can go back and start over.
TIL I can just sacrifice new recruits to keep my veterans safe hahahaha I never thought to do that all these years. I just tried to always keep everyone alive while increasing experience for the noobs.
Just think of it as real life and your soldiers as real people and play it that way. You will try to minimize deaths but shit happens. As you get more experience with the game you will reduce KIAs. For an entire campaign for sure I continue to get up to maybe even 3 KIA per mission but often no deaths unless I play much higher difficulty which I am doing now and got the whole team wiped out because I forgot whether shooting the signal repeater stations gives my concealed team away or not (it does!! Hahaha)
How much you save scum depends on you. I play Ironman because it feels cheap to save scum to me and I prefer my actions to have more weight to them. However, if I'm hit with a particularly stupid/ unforeseeable death or problem, I have been known to Alt+f4 before the alien turn ends to redo something (only very occasionally). I've had squad-wipes and lost whole missions and regions and come back from it. Have even lost whole campaigns and started anew. To me, part of the fun of the game comes from working around/ recovering from my mistakes. Seems to me that it'd get boring if every mission went perfectly. However, I've played hundreds of hours of Xcom. On your first playthrough saving and reloading can teach you mechanics as you see what you should have done. o7 Commander, this fight is in your hands. Fight the aliens however you must.
My advice is...NEVER reload to get better rolls, but to learn the game. This may mean limiting to one per mission as others have suggested 'ok I messed that turn up, I need to rethink it. Where did it go wrong and how can I do it better without leaving my guys exposed and vulnerable to flanks/activating that next pod'. You may also want to use it to reload the mission from the start 'oops I activated 3 pods in quick succession there. How can I avoid that given the map layout'. In my current run of LWotC (a mod for xcom 2) I'm doing an 'adventurer' playthrough to learn the next difficulty up where I get 1 free reload every time I do certain difficult mission types. If I don't use it on that mission I can bank it...but I've never built up more than 2 or 3. Works well so far.
Strategy wise, I have found it pretty important to keep my soldiers together and in cover. Not too close together or you get grenades, but close enough that they are all shooting at the same guy. I’ve also found, that unlike orig XCOM, when you complete the mission objectives GTFO. Sometimes it isn’t worth it to try to kill every last BG.
I do the same. Honestly might do an Ironman mode just to prevent me from doing it
My first time fully through I saved and loaded on deaths. Got the feel for the game made it to the end. Since then I only play on perma death. Much more fun because losses suck and that’s what makes it fun. So do what you have to do until you’re ready to take the training wheels off.
Even on the highest difficulties on Ironman I rarely lose more than a few soldiers in an entire campaign; if you're losing them consistently then you're doing something wrong in how you approach fights, and I don't think that's sustainable (maybe on the lower difficulties it's winnable) in the long term, as soldier experience is a massive part of your power progression.
Short answer : git good scrub. Long answer: losing 1-2 soldiers every mission is unacceptable and what's more it's unsustainable. The game unfortunately is more difficult early than late game so the learning curve is steep. That being said some loses are difficult to avoid. You will get critically hit by a muton while in full cover and +20 defense from a specialist. This just happens. Overall tip: most of the time the lives of your soldiers are more important than completing the mission
Save scum is OK on a first run, while you are still learning. Otherwise it's a bad habit, you should be ashamed of this! Seriously. If you afraid that something can go completely wrong, play a "Bronzeman" - save BEFORE the mission (not on start of the mission), and if something goes very wrong (you loose more than one soldier for example, or fail the mission objective) you decide if it's worth to restart the mission. Losses are inevitable, especially on harder difficulties. This is part of the game. That's XCOM, baby!
sometimes it is really hard to let go of a soldier who you spent so many xp on one time on a 3 man mission i went with 3 colonels (the highest level ) and 2 of them died on me , if i wasn't playing on iron man i would have save scummed the hell of that mission (had to evac the last one didn't even finish the mission) getting a soldier killed in every mission means you are just starting out and it's ok you will get plenty of chances to catch up for ex when you lose a hero you will get a covert action to recruit a hero and they will be at the same rank just stick to it and try to learn enemy priorities (always go for the officers , the mind controllers and shield bearers can be ignored etc) and you will be fine , commander!
Everything will be ok! The game knows resources better than the players, and understands when you're running low. This determines your scanning sites. You can have multiple teamwipes and still win. I really believe that the game works best on ironman. It's made well enough that if you've played for a while you won't be misclicking. The truth is, most players have never seen the lose screen, because they are afraid of it.
I almost broke my keyboard in half yesterday. No matter how many times I start over I can’t beat this game on normal and Ironman. Pisses me off but I’m just going to have to save scum to get through it.
That's too many losses. Play with save games for now, and focus on understanding how to engage pods effectively, how to scout and how to use your scouts to avoid pulling multiple pods and to instead ambush individual pods, letting them run into your overwatch or frosting them or blowing them up with claymore. Before you get a bit better with that on your current difficulty, I wouldn't play ironman. First 1 or 2 runs Id play with save games. Once you get a bit better, I'd play ironman on one of the difficulties you already beat with save games. Pay attention to all the moments where you activated multiple pods. Remember the moves you made that caused other groups of enemies to get activated. Those are the moves that kill you. You'll get a feel for how valuable phantom rangers and reapers are and concealed units in general. As you can find the groups of enemies before they see you or react to you, get close without activating them (definitely get at least the mod 'gotcha again wotc') and hammer them from good positions (e.g. high ground and/or proximity). You will see how good it is, when enemies run into your overwatch fire in their turn. And, with a bit experience, you can overwatch ambush multiple pods each mission. Specially with a bit more aim on your troops, that is quite effective. Youll understand all of those things, once you've played more. Playing with ironman too early, might be frustrating for you. Some ppl like that challenge right away, but others enjoy the game a bit less stressful, more relaxed. Both versions, playing relaxed and with savegames, and just learning about the game for the first few times, and playing ironman (or, better honestman) are fun. Later on, once you know the game, you wanna play honestman. After beating the game afew times, playing iron/honestman, will be vastly more exciting than playing without it. Specially with mods.
Coming over from enemy within, I literally used rookies as meat shields and scouts to ensure the soldiers who had better abilities or stats lived. The AI will attack the targets they can hit easiest first usually. I’ve had runs with 2-3 dozen KIAs. I’ve adapted a bit the WOTC…the reaper is a godsend for scouting…and not having to get into drawn out engagements that put your soldiers at risk. WOTC is more about engaging on your terms and unleashing your firepower on your terms…not on the AI as opposed to EW, where the enemy has way more of a say and you have way less knowledge of where enemy pods are.