XCom: Enemy Unknown (2012)

KHANanaphone

Edit history:

KHANanaphone: 2014-08-04 10:42:44 am

KHANanaphone: 2014-08-04 10:42:24 am

2013-01-16 04:46:50 pm

Fiiive

EDIT: Papers made a wiki page with more detail/newer strats. Read/edit this instead.

==== WARNING: The stuff below this is outdated =================

So I've been playing this game quite a bit to see if a speedrun is viable, and I think it probably is. Easy is probably the only sensible difficulty to use, since the others give you way less money to work with, and are less forgiving in terms of countries bailing out. I'm just going to leave a bunch of notes here (they're for single segment, but they could easily be extrapolated).

Home base area: Europe (you need a bunch of workshops and labs)

Required to beat the game:
1) Intro mission
2) Research xeno biology
3) Research arc thrower (5 fragments), create alien containment
4) Capture alien, interrogate it
5) Assault alien base
6) Make a Firestorm w/ emp cannon (plasma cannon takes too many fragments to research)
7) Make hyperwave decoder
8) Find a gifted soldier w/ psi labs
9) Defeat overseer, make gollup chamber, research psi armor
10) Final mission

Here are the big bottlenecks to beating the game:

1) 85 Weapon fragments
You need 85 weapon fragments, so you generally have to stay away from using grenades, even though they would speed up most of the earlier missions. You want all these fragments immediately after the base assault so you can research New Fighter Craft. After taking down a base, missions get WAY harder, so you want to get these early.

2) 4 UFO Flight Computers
The number of flight computers you get from downed UFOs is random. I think you need about 3 UFOs worth of alloys/elerium anyway though, so hopefully you can get 4 computers from them. I'd guess the odds are around 75% of getting 4 or more, but that's speculation. Power sources are basically free since the base has plenty of them.

3) 30 Engineers
You need 30 engineers to make the emp cannon or the psi armor. To do this, you will need to acquire 25 engineers. My current solution to this is make 3 workshops (+15), do 2 abductions for engineers (+8), and have a satellite in USA for the last 2 (1 per month). Sometimes you can pick up random engineers from a request and skip an abduction, but that might leave you low on fragments.

4) Dooooom tracker
Yeah this is a tricky one. I get scientists from the first abductions to speed up research time, but sometimes it hasn't seemed fast enough. If you're lucky, you can pick up some random scientists from a request. Regardless, the solution surely can't be to actually do a Terror mission, they are just awful.

5) Interceptors might fail to take down medium UFOs
Yep. This is annoying when it happens.

6) Base assault
The base's difficulty scales with time, so you absolutely want to do it before 2 months are done (or else it may have mutons). However, no matter how early you do it, it will probably be swarming with chrysalids. Solution: SHIVs. I try to take 3 with me on this mission and send them in front so at least you won't be swarmed with zombies. Still, you have to be extremely careful during the mission. Don't aggro a pack of them with your last action of the turn, you are screwed if you do. I've seen as many as 11 in one mission. This mission is hard.

7) Overseer mission
This will have 4 muton elites, 1 sectopod, 2 drones, 2 super floaters, and an ethereal. There's no way you can do this mission with a team of goobers. Good news though, when you research New Fight Craft, you can immediately skip to Hover SHIVs. Still, this one is also going to be a gigantic problem.

8) Final battle
Use your team of SHIVs as a front-line for your "chosen one". This is definitely possible, but it's really really hard. Also, don't stand right next to the uber ethereal with your human when you deal the final blow. It won't count as a victory.

9) Money
Sell corpses, put your free satellite in USA (it has the highest $). You should be fine.

One final thing: for a game that's so buggy, I have honestly not found any bugs that would be remotely helpful to running it (except for the time an ethereal decided to kill itself with vortex while missing all of my units).

Thread title:

EDIT: [url=https://kb.speeddemosarchive.com/XCOM:_Enemy_Unknown_(2012)#]Papers made a wiki page with more detail/newer strats. Read/edit this instead.[/url]

==== WARNING: The stuff below this is outdated =================

So I've been playing this game quite a bit to see if a speedrun is viable, and I think it probably is. Easy is probably the only sensible difficulty to use, since the others give you way less money to work with, and are less forgiving in terms of countries bailing out. I'm just going to leave a bunch of notes here (they're for single segment, but they could easily be extrapolated).

Home base area: Europe (you need a bunch of workshops and labs)

Required to beat the game:
1) Intro mission
2) Research xeno biology
3) Research arc thrower (5 fragments), create alien containment
4) Capture alien, interrogate it
5) Assault alien base
6) Make a Firestorm w/ emp cannon (plasma cannon takes too many fragments to research)
7) Make hyperwave decoder
8) Find a gifted soldier w/ psi labs
9) Defeat overseer, make gollup chamber, research psi armor
10) Final mission

Here are the big bottlenecks to beating the game:

1) 85 Weapon fragments
You need 85 weapon fragments, so you generally have to stay away from using grenades, even though they would speed up most of the earlier missions. You want all these fragments immediately after the base assault so you can research New Fighter Craft. After taking down a base, missions get WAY harder, so you want to get these early.

2) 4 UFO Flight Computers
The number of flight computers you get from downed UFOs is random. I think you need about 3 UFOs worth of alloys/elerium anyway though, so hopefully you can get 4 computers from them. I'd guess the odds are around 75% of getting 4 or more, but that's speculation. Power sources are basically free since the base has plenty of them.

3) 30 Engineers
You need 30 engineers to make the emp cannon or the psi armor. To do this, you will need to acquire 25 engineers. My current solution to this is make 3 workshops (+15), do 2 abductions for engineers (+8), and have a satellite in USA for the last 2 (1 per month). Sometimes you can pick up random engineers from a request and skip an abduction, but that might leave you low on fragments.

4) Dooooom tracker
Yeah this is a tricky one. I get scientists from the first abductions to speed up research time, but sometimes it hasn't seemed fast enough. If you're lucky, you can pick up some random scientists from a request. Regardless, the solution surely can't be to actually do a Terror mission, they are just awful.

5) Interceptors might fail to take down medium UFOs
Yep. This is annoying when it happens.

6) Base assault
The base's difficulty scales with time, so you absolutely want to do it before 2 months are done (or else it may have mutons). However, no matter how early you do it, it will probably be swarming with chrysalids. Solution: SHIVs. I try to take 3 with me on this mission and send them in front so at least you won't be swarmed with zombies. Still, you have to be extremely careful during the mission. Don't aggro a pack of them with your last action of the turn, you are screwed if you do. I've seen as many as 11 in one mission. This mission is hard.

7) Overseer mission
This will have 4 muton elites, 1 sectopod, 2 drones, 2 super floaters, and an ethereal. There's no way you can do this mission with a team of goobers. Good news though, when you research New Fight Craft, you can immediately skip to Hover SHIVs. Still, this one is also going to be a gigantic problem.

8) Final battle
Use your team of SHIVs as a front-line for your "chosen one". This is definitely possible, but it's really really hard. Also, don't stand right next to the uber ethereal with your human when you deal the final blow. It won't count as a victory.

9) Money
Sell corpses, put your free satellite in USA (it has the highest $). You should be fine.

One final thing: for a game that's so buggy, I have honestly not found any bugs that would be remotely helpful to running it (except for the time an ethereal decided to kill itself with vortex while missing all of my units).

KHANanaphone

2013-02-06 04:09:52 pm

Fiiive

New route, use satellites to get 3/3 in North America so you get +4 engineers / +4 scientists for 2 of the months. This makes the end game research waaay more reliable, and you only need to do one engineer abduction, so it skips a mission.

Once I get a video of a run with no gameover I'll post it here (even if I fail the last mission, it'll still be good for routing).

Siyko

2013-02-11 03:11:12 pm

I used to be athiest until I realized I was God.

Sounds really interesting, I'd love to see a run of this.

Why use SHIV's? I haven't played with a speedrun in mind, just playing through the game, but what advantages do they have over rookies?

KHANanaphone

2013-02-13 11:12:19 pm

Fiiive

Finally got one that made it through to the end:

http://www.twitch.tv/khananaphone/c/1925443

SHIVs don't turn into zombies and do about twice the damage so they're waaay better in the base assault. Then hover SHIVs are just amazing and require no additional research, so that's not really even close.

Bevilr

2013-02-17 11:53:20 am

Wow! Really impressed with that considering it was single segment. I think you've got a pretty good strat here. I was very impressed with you luck, and obviously easy has something to do with it. I think a sub 1:45 SS is not out of the question following the same route you already have, and with a save scumming multisegment you could go WAY lower.

A quick note on the final mission: throwing mind controlled units into voids as they come out of mind control (especially that muton in the second to last room) is a good way to soften them up before they come out of it. Bunch of other smaller notes/errors but I feel pretty sure you're aware of. Most was just trying to rush through at all times - things like the numbering changing on the hot keys tripped you up a few times. I definitely feel you on how hard it is to keep the pace of you choices up without making smaller errors.

Also knowing when one of those small errors causes something that will set you back in the game and make your life harder vs just a miss click that will cost a few seconds is so hard to tell until after the fact. I guess maybe (as weird as this sounds in a speedrunning forum) I'm suggesting you slow down a little bit, as I think the soldiers you could have saved from not making some of those errors might outweigh the time you save keeping a faster pace? If nothing else you'll probably find your runs getting further more often.

Great run though and I'm excited to see more!

Wow! Really impressed with that considering it was single segment. I think you've got a pretty good strat here. I was very impressed with you luck, and obviously easy has something to do with it. I think a sub 1:45 SS is not out of the question following the same route you already have, and with a save scumming multisegment you could go WAY lower.

A quick note on the final mission: throwing mind controlled units into voids as they come out of mind control (especially that muton in the second to last room) is a good way to soften them up before they come out of it. Bunch of other smaller notes/errors but I feel pretty sure you're aware of. Most was just trying to rush through at all times - things like the numbering changing on the hot keys tripped you up a few times. I definitely feel you on how hard it is to keep the pace of you choices up without making smaller errors.

Also knowing when one of those small errors causes something that will set you back in the game and make your life harder vs just a miss click that will cost a few seconds is so hard to tell until after the fact. I guess maybe (as weird as this sounds in a speedrunning forum) I'm suggesting you slow down a little bit, as I think the soldiers you could have saved from not making some of those errors might outweigh the time you save keeping a faster pace? If nothing else you'll probably find your runs getting further more often.

Great run though and I'm excited to see more!

KHANanaphone

2013-02-17 03:40:34 pm

Fiiive

Yeah the time could definitely be way lower. There are a lot of little things I still have to learn, like a more consistent base layout (though it can be tricky since the amount of money I have at any given time varies), and more obvious things like controlling mind-control durations.

A segmented run would be pretty sweet, it might be a good change of pace. It would probably be a ton of work though.

BruiserT89

2014-01-21 11:27:58 pm

Is the link no longer working?

Paperboat

Edit history:

Paperboat: 2014-02-25 10:04:51 am

Paperboat: 2014-02-25 10:02:39 am

2014-02-25 12:02:02 am

XCOM Timesheet: http://goo.gl/BWDqbC

Hi guys, I've been running this game for a very short time now, but I think I know enough at this point to give a more detailed description of the route to anyone else who might be interested. Also since KHANanaphone's video got deleted somehow I thought this might be valuable.

As a speedrun, XCOM can be understood in two unique phases. The first phase is the Pre-Base Assault phase. This phase resembles in many ways how most people play XCOM. The second phase is the rush phase where you just rush through the required missions at the fastest rate possible, ignoring as the world goes up in flames around you (and believe me, it does). In this post, I'll just go over phase 1.

The route as I have it can get screwed by RNG in several ways, I've noted them below.
-Complete intro mission
-Start Xeno-Biology and excavate any area you can in the Build Facilities tab, then scan.
-You will usually get an abduction mission, but you may get a UFO mission. If you get the Abduction mission, choose the option which gives engineers. Whatever you didnt get the first time (UFO mission or abduction) you will get next time. As soon as you have gotten your engineers, start a workshop and 2 satellites. Also again, excavate any unexcavated space on the first level. If you get the engineers too late in the month (usually when you get the UFO mission first), it is possible that RNG has already screwed your run. More on that below.
-Start the Arc Thrower after Xeno-Biology. Also start a satellite uplink after the workshop is finished. You will need to sell corpses and possibly alloys for this. Dont worry though, you probably wont be running short of alloys. If the UFO gave you 30 elerium, you might want to sell some of that off as well. Immediately after this, check to see if your satellite uplink is scheduled to finish before the council report on the mission control screen. If it isn't, I would reset.
-The 4th mission (after the intro, the first UFO mission, and the abduction mission) will either be another abduction mission or a council mission. You need money now so pick whichever one comes first and offers said money, ignore the other. (if you dont get the money fast enough, you can be screwed later. More on that below)
-As soon as you have the money, build the alien containment facility, a power generator, and a lift. Also about here, arc thrower research will finish and you will want to start Alien Materials.
-As soon as your uplink finishes, launch satellites to get 3/3 in NA. Also transfer an interceptor to NA.
-Council Report, you get a ton of money. When you can, start Experimental Warfare, excavate your second level, hopefully get a thermo generator up, get some labs.
-Start the foundry AS SOON as you can. If your foundry doesnt finish by mid-month, you wont have SHIVS by the end of the month and I would just reset there.
-As for missions, ignore any mission until you have alien containment finished. Once it is, take whatever you can get. An engineering abduction is ideal. Give your arc thrower to a support class with the movement upgrade. If you're on a UFO mission, you might want to try to get both the outsider shard and the stunned alien in one go since its hard to say when you will see another UFO. However, you wont want to ignore an engineering abduction.
-Dont interrupt experimental warfare research for the interrogation research, you can wait. once its done though, interrogate the alien, build the foundry, build 2 phoenix cannons (makes taking down medium UFOs consistent) and keep on scanning for the UFO and an outsider to catch.
-Once your, foundry is done, start heavy weapon's platform immediately, then immediately build 3-4 shivs.
-Once you have the shard, researching it will grant immediate entry to the alien base, but you want to wait for shivs so there is downtime to research other things. These things will be alien power source and alien flight computer. If you have downtime between researches at any other time during part 1, you should be researching these things. Unfortunately, getting a power source or sufficient computers is RNG and can screw you. Usually there is an opportunity before the end of the month to do an additional UFO mission to try to pick em up. Even if you dont need to though, you prob want to shoot down this craft to make sure it doesnt shoot down your satellites. you dont have to send the skyranger. It is also in rare occurences possible to get carapace armor for your men before you go into the base. Also, ignore the terror mission, and screw whoever the petty nation is which withdraws from the council because of it.
-You want to have going into the base assault 50-60 weap fragments (you cannot use explosives at all in earlier missions), all researches which ive mentioned completed, 2 alien nav computers (frequently screws you), at least 2 labs, and 21 engineers+
-The squad you attack the base with should be 3-4 shivs, and 1-2 soldiers. The soldiers will ideally be a Sergeant/Lieutenant heavy and a Lieutenant Assault. The Lieutenant assault can 1 turn kill a chrysalid with rapid shot which none of your other men can. The heavy can use a rocket with a grenade from the assault to kill groups of chryssalids. However, you still need weap fragments so dont use explosives vs any other type of unit.

Thats pretty much it for part one. I'll post more when I understand part 2 better. However the outline is that you go right into New Fighter Craft, build firestorm and some hoover shivs, then emp cannon, hyperwave relay, ignore everything else as the world burns, shoot down the overseer, psy labs, gollop chamber, final mission with hoover shivs and your psy soldier. yaddayadda, hope this helps someone!

Hi guys, I've been running this game for a very short time now, but I think I know enough at this point to give a more detailed description of the route to anyone else who might be interested. Also since KHANanaphone's video got deleted somehow I thought this might be valuable.

As a speedrun, XCOM can be understood in two unique phases. The first phase is the Pre-Base Assault phase. This phase resembles in many ways how most people play XCOM. The second phase is the rush phase where you just rush through the required missions at the fastest rate possible, ignoring as the world goes up in flames around you (and believe me, it does). In this post, I'll just go over phase 1.

The route as I have it can get screwed by RNG in several ways, I've noted them below. 
-Complete intro mission
-Start Xeno-Biology and excavate any area you can in the Build Facilities tab, then scan.
-You will usually get an abduction mission, but you may get a UFO mission. If you get the Abduction mission, choose the option which gives engineers. Whatever you didnt get the first time (UFO mission or abduction) you will get next time. As soon as you have gotten your engineers, start a workshop and 2 satellites. Also again, excavate any unexcavated space on the first level. If you get the engineers too late in the month (usually when you get the UFO mission first), it is possible that RNG has already screwed your run. More on that below.
-Start the Arc Thrower after Xeno-Biology. Also start a satellite uplink after the workshop is finished. You will need to sell corpses and possibly alloys for this. Dont worry though, you probably wont be running short of alloys. If the UFO gave you 30 elerium, you might want to sell some of that off as well. Immediately after this, check to see if your satellite uplink is scheduled to finish before the council report on the mission control screen. If it isn't, I would reset.
-The 4th mission (after the intro, the first UFO mission, and the abduction mission) will either be another abduction mission or a council mission. You need money now so pick whichever one comes first and offers said money, ignore the other. (if you dont get the money fast enough, you can be screwed later. More on that below)
-As soon as you have the money, build the alien containment facility, a power generator, and a lift. Also about here, arc thrower research will finish and you will want to start Alien Materials.
-As soon as your uplink finishes, launch satellites to get 3/3 in NA. Also transfer an interceptor to NA.
-Council Report, you get a ton of money. When you can, start Experimental Warfare, excavate your second level, hopefully get a thermo generator up, get some labs.
-Start the foundry AS SOON as you can. If your foundry doesnt finish by mid-month, you wont have SHIVS by the end of the month and I would just reset there.
-As for missions, ignore any mission until you have alien containment finished. Once it is, take whatever you can get. An engineering abduction is ideal. Give your arc thrower to a support class with the movement upgrade. If you're on a UFO mission, you might want to try to get both the outsider shard and the stunned alien in one go since its hard to say when you will see another UFO. However, you wont want to ignore an engineering abduction.
-Dont interrupt experimental warfare research for the interrogation research, you can wait. once its done though, interrogate the alien, build the foundry, build 2 phoenix cannons (makes taking down medium UFOs consistent) and keep on scanning for the UFO and an outsider to catch.
-Once your, foundry is done, start heavy weapon's platform immediately, then immediately build 3-4 shivs.
-Once you have the shard, researching it will grant immediate entry to the alien base, but you want to wait for shivs so there is downtime to research other things. These things will be alien power source and alien flight computer. If you have downtime between researches at any other time during part 1, you should be researching these things. Unfortunately, getting a power source or sufficient computers is RNG and can screw you. Usually there is an opportunity before the end of the month to do an additional UFO mission to try to pick em up. Even if you dont need to though, you prob want to shoot down this craft to make sure it doesnt shoot down your satellites. you dont have to send the skyranger. It is also in rare occurences possible to get carapace armor for your men before you go into the base. Also, ignore the terror mission, and screw whoever the petty nation is which withdraws from the council because of it.
-You want to have going into the base assault 50-60 weap fragments (you cannot use explosives at all in earlier missions), all researches which ive mentioned completed, 2 alien nav computers (frequently screws you), at least 2 labs, and 21 engineers+
-The squad you attack the base with should be 3-4 shivs, and 1-2 soldiers. The soldiers will ideally be a Sergeant/Lieutenant heavy and a Lieutenant Assault. The Lieutenant assault can 1 turn kill a chrysalid with rapid shot which none of your other men can. The heavy can use  a rocket with a grenade from the assault to kill groups of chryssalids. However, you still need weap fragments so dont use explosives vs any other type of unit.

Thats pretty much it for part one. I'll post more when I understand part 2 better. However the outline is that you go right into New Fighter Craft, build firestorm and some hoover shivs, then emp cannon, hyperwave relay, ignore everything else as the world burns, shoot down the overseer, psy labs, gollop chamber, final mission with hoover shivs and your psy soldier. yaddayadda, hope this helps someone!

Wooba

2014-02-25 01:52:04 pm

You consider doing this with some of the Second Wave options? I'm not sure how it would affect the run being accepted, but some can be quite beneficial. Example, the "Not Created Equal" option can start you off with some really good rookies, making it easier overall and faster. The problem comes from then needing X Aim for Y Class, and if you don't get it you either roll with it or restart. It could get pretty tedious.

I also am not able to check out the video, being at work and all, but from the looks of things you rely heavily on SHIVs. I've always found that Squad Sighted snipers are incredibly useful for one-shotting xenos, but it depends on how far you can actually advance them before the end of the game in a speed run. Personally, I've never run the game on Easy (Too much of a man) so I don't know just how "easy" it really is. The hard part with Snipers is getting them enough Experience to level up to even get Squad Sight, but once you get it, you rain down the justice.

Paperboat

2014-02-25 02:25:32 pm

XCOM Timesheet: http://goo.gl/BWDqbC

Yeah, snipers are extremely powerful late game in my experience, but they are also fundamentally a slow unit because they cannot move between shots. On the base assault mission and the final mission, if you want to do them fast you have to be constantly covering ground, and shivs cover a ton of ground. I haven't thought about the second wave options, but that sounds like a different category to me. It might be something to work on after there is a solid route for the game as it is. Also more RNG is not something im really looking to add to this run right now lol.

The video which KHAN posted is no longer on twitch and I cant record right now, but ill get up a complete run up here as soon as I can.

Wooba

2014-02-25 02:34:24 pm

At the least the Sniper would be viable for open maps, so basically UFO crash sites for the smaller crafts. But by that point, what's the point in putting effort into a soldier if you're not going to be using them for most of the missions? For the one Soldier you do take, what preference do you have? Assault or Heavy I'd imagine, but Support can heal themselves and have increased movement. Though I'd still be inclinded towards the stopping power of an Assault with a Rifle for added saftey so you're not running them into flocks of Xenos.

Paperboat

2014-02-25 06:21:29 pm

XCOM Timesheet: http://goo.gl/BWDqbC

Well how it works, the game kinda picks your last soldier for you. I think heavy is a good option because of the extra damage vs mechanical (sectopod's and cyberdisks are some of the few things laser shivs cant 1 shot), and because the research for laser shivs is the same as the research for the heavy laser weapon. Assaults punch through mutons really fast but dont have many other advantages. Support sounds a bit too conservative to me though the movement bonus would be nice.

Wooba

2014-02-25 06:28:15 pm

THe movement bonus would be nice, though moving more spaces doesn't help things go faster in this game. And while it's somewhat random, you still pick who goes into the Chamber. Basically you can get the solider you want to go in, but there would be a stack of things that would need to go right for that to happen, and many resets would likely occur.

Paperboat

Edit history:

Paperboat: 2014-02-25 06:32:27 pm

2014-02-25 06:31:15 pm

XCOM Timesheet: http://goo.gl/BWDqbC

ye, you can put in 3 soldiers at a time, so i usually just send in my 3 highest ranks and take whatever it gives me. Also, the way the final mission works where you start off going through a lot of weak creatures and then advance to more and more powerful ones, movement bonuses are actually nice. Esp since hoover shivs move so far and it sucks waiting for Mr. Chosen One to catch up.

Wooba

2014-02-25 06:50:35 pm

That sounds reasonable. Snipers can be a pain since they're so slow, but I know especially on that final mission you can really exploit the Squad Sight ability, though it only becomes ridiculously overpowered when paired with Archangel armor. Heavies can easily clear out a room with a rocket, but Assaults get that nifty ability thatl ets them fire on enemies coming within 3 tiles. Great for Beserkers or Chrysalids.

I've never used a SHIV, so I'm not sure how good they are. I'm aware they can be used as mobile cover, but the fact they don't have abilities seems like a drawback. But speedruns usually don't rely on what is smart or better, but what gets the job done faster.

Paperboat

2014-02-25 06:57:15 pm

XCOM Timesheet: http://goo.gl/BWDqbC

Pretty much that last sentence haha. There is also just so much less tangential research time to make a powerful shiv vs. a powerful soldier.

Wooba

2014-02-25 07:26:06 pm

That's also true. One thing I don't agree with is that this can be done only on Easy. Single Segment, perhaps. But you could do a Segmented run on Impossible if you tried hard enough. Doing it in a Single would be the reason that brain tumor developed, but doing it Segmented wouldn't be out of the question. It all just comes down to who can do it the fastest. Plenty of games are done on the highest difficulty, despite it being much harder, so although this would be ridiculous, it isn't, as the difficulty suggests, impossible.

Paperboat

2014-02-25 07:50:41 pm

XCOM Timesheet: http://goo.gl/BWDqbC

KHAN's reasoning for easy was that you could skip a lot more non-essential missions since countries panic and leave less easily on easy. So in other words in addition to just being harder, a higher difficulty run would probably have many more required missions. Of course if you want to do it, more power to you. It's just not what im looking to do right now.

Paperboat

2014-03-16 08:43:38 pm

XCOM Timesheet: http://goo.gl/BWDqbC

So what I'm starting to realize is that this game is just way way too much of a pain to try to run single-segment. That KHAN somehow got sub-2 hrs blows me away. I was trying to record a run so at least it was available, but now I'm shifting my focus to a segmented run (which just seems to make more sense with such a random game).

Right now what I'm struggling with is the Overseer UFO. The mission is insanely hard to do with projectile SHIVs so I've been trying to route out a way to get enough weapon fragments for SHIV Laser. However, I'm still trying to determine if this is even possible without running another abduction mission which I really don't want to do. If it isn't, I might just have to manmode the overseer segment.
Another thing to consider is that if I go into the overseer mission with no SHIV laser and no weapon fragments, then there are exactly enough weapon fragments available on the Overseer mission to research SHIV laser. This makes getting SHIV laser beforehand a bit wasteful. Another option is to rush for a psy soldier, but Im not sure the early psy abilities do too much.

anyway, thats my status with regards to this game. I'm gonna keep going with it at least until I get a good segmented run up. Hope someone find this interesting/helpful or has some tips for me!

So what I'm starting to realize is that this game is just way way too much of a pain to try to run single-segment. That KHAN somehow got sub-2 hrs blows me away. I was trying to record a run so at least it was available, but now I'm shifting my focus to a segmented run (which just seems to make more sense with such a random game).

Right now what I'm struggling with is the Overseer UFO. The mission is insanely hard to do with projectile SHIVs so I've been trying to route out a way to get enough weapon fragments for SHIV Laser. However, I'm still trying to determine if this is even possible without running another abduction mission which I really don't want to do. If it isn't, I might just have to manmode the overseer segment.
Another thing to consider is that if I go into the overseer mission with no SHIV laser and no weapon fragments, then there are exactly enough weapon fragments available on the Overseer mission to research SHIV laser. This makes getting SHIV laser beforehand a bit wasteful. Another option is to rush for a psy soldier, but Im not sure the early psy abilities do too much.

anyway, thats my status with regards to this game. I'm gonna keep going with it at least until I get a good segmented run up. Hope someone find this interesting/helpful or has some tips for me!

Paperboat

Edit history:

Paperboat: 2014-05-01 02:25:23 pm

Paperboat: 2014-05-01 02:25:04 pm

2014-05-01 02:23:05 pm

XCOM Timesheet: http://goo.gl/BWDqbC

Quick update on the segmented run, I'm pretty much finished routing at this point and have recorded the first few missions. The run will do 2 ufo missions, 3 abduction missions, the intro mission and the 3 story missions for a total of a 9 mission run. The first 6 segments which include the first 3 missions are siting at under 5 minutes combined. As soon as I'm off school I'll be putting a lot more time into this run and I hope to have it in its final form by the end of summer. Yay!

Edit: also a quick question if anyone knows the answer. If I submit this to SDA, will they add .5 seconds per segment even if I only use auto saves to segment?

Onin

2014-05-01 03:51:53 pm

Only manual saves are penalized in order to prevent abuse.

Paperboat

Edit history:

Paperboat: 2014-05-06 02:30:05 pm

2014-05-06 02:28:42 pm

XCOM Timesheet: http://goo.gl/BWDqbC

Enemy despawns in the final mission are now a thing! I can despawn the cyberdisks and the drones in the first room and all enemies but the uber ethereal in the last room using save-load tricks. As of yet I cant find a way to despawn anything else and I suspect that it may not be possible to but I'll continue looking.

In order to despawn the cyberdisks and the drones:
These enemies normally spawn at the start of your turn the first turn that the 2 sectoids and the sectoid commander in the first room are dead. If you load the autosave made at the beginning of the turn after the cyberdisks spawn, they will despawn but they will respawn each successive turn and even if you use the autosave trick every turn, the game will never spawn the chryssalids and open the door to the next area. The solution is to make a manual save immediately after the autosave just as as or a little after the game takes control of your camera. If you time it right, which isnt terribly difficult, and then reload that save, the cyberdisks will not spawn and will not try to spawn each successive turn. The chryssalids will also spawn appropriately.

In order to despawn the final room:
Pretty much the same thing, make a manual save right after the cutscene and reload it. However i find that this doesnt really save time because I usually try to 1 turn burst down the uber ethereal anyway.

There are a ton of other places in the final mission where this trick could theoretically work but for one reason or another, it doesnt. Despawning chryssalids cant be done cause the game locks your menu, and despawning the last 2 muton elites in the second to last room doesnt open the door and actually softlocks the game.

But all in all pretty excited about the first major helpful glitch in XCOM: EU speedrunning!

Enemy despawns in the final mission are now a thing! I can despawn the cyberdisks and the drones in the first room and all enemies but the uber ethereal in the last room using save-load tricks. As of yet I cant find a way to despawn anything else and I suspect that it may not be possible to but I'll continue looking.

In order to despawn the cyberdisks and the drones:
These enemies normally spawn at the start of your turn the first turn that the 2 sectoids and the sectoid commander in the first room are dead. If you load the autosave made at the beginning of the turn after the cyberdisks spawn, they will despawn but they will respawn each successive turn and even if you use the autosave trick every turn, the game will never spawn the chryssalids and open the door to the next area. The solution is to make a manual save immediately after the autosave just as as or a little after the game takes control of your camera. If you time it right, which isnt terribly difficult, and then reload that save, the cyberdisks will not spawn and will not try to spawn each successive turn. The chryssalids will also spawn appropriately.

In order to despawn the final room:
Pretty much the same thing, make a manual save right after the cutscene and reload it. However i find that this doesnt really save time because I usually try to 1 turn burst down the uber ethereal anyway.

There are a ton of other places in the final mission where this trick could theoretically work but for one reason or another, it doesnt. Despawning chryssalids cant be done cause the game locks your menu, and despawning the last 2 muton elites in the second to last room doesnt open the door and actually softlocks the game.

But all in all pretty excited about the first major helpful glitch in XCOM: EU speedrunning!

Paperboat

2014-06-12 04:02:50 pm

XCOM Timesheet: http://goo.gl/BWDqbC

Update: Apparently the two muton elites before the last room are despawnable without softlocking the game. There just appears to be a very narrow timing window between when the door opens and when the mutons spawn.

I ended up throwing out some segments earlier over some annoying technicalities, but starting this Friday I'm going back into segment grinding mode. I might even stream some of it if my internet proves stable at http://www.twitch.tv/papers7

Paperboat

2014-07-06 11:35:26 pm

My timesheet for anyone who is interested:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1K6WC2V5eJMfFSeHwuw0VBSEHXEHnjnpFx0yHxcvnn5c/edit?usp=sharing

Just to throw it out there, if anyone is wants to help out with the run, you can message me on twitch and I'll set you up. All you really need is a copy of XCOM and the ability to record in 1080p. The execution is straightforward enough that really anyone can do it, it just requires a lot of time. I'm not holding out much hope or anything, but just in case someone has too much free time, your help would be enormously appreciated :p

Also, I've been trying to stream a bit more and I'll be streaming segment attempts tonight.

Twyn

2014-07-13 12:46:56 pm

I started to learn your route, it's going ok in the first half, I manage to put down the overseer and succeed the mission, but the time it takes to get a firestorm ready, emp cannon, all the research, the 4th council comes up and GAME OVER.

Is the route that tight and the RNG screwed me a little ? Or do you manage to complete the game before the 4th council ?
Anyway, I'll keep trying, I'd love to see the sub 2h run, or any complete run, to see what I'm doing wrong.

If you're not at 4ufo's computers by the base assault, do you reset, or do an extra UFO after ? (that's what I went for so far, doesn't seem to matter to complete the game. It's maybe an extra mission, and big time loss... So here is the route I'm following, any comment ?

Code:

[MISSION]							[ENGINEERING]						[RESEARCH]						

[INTRO]--------------------------------------------------------------
									[EXCAVATE]							[XENO-BI0LOGY]
[ABDUCTION : 4ENGI]--------------------------------------------------		
									[WORKSHOP]								
									[SATELLITES x2]							
									[EXCAVATE]							[ARC THROWER]
[UFO CRASH]----------------------------------------------------------		
									[SATELLITE UPLINK]					
[ABDUCTION : 200$]---------------------------------------------------								
									[ALIEN CONTAINEMENT]					
									[POWER GENERATOR]					[ALIEN MATERIALS]
									[LIFT]									
																								
[COUNCIL REPORT]														[EXPERIMENTAL WARFARE]
									[EXCAVATE]								
									[FOUNDRY]								
									>has to be finished before the 15th		
									[ARC THROWER]							
									[2 PHOENIX CANNON]																				
									[LABS]
									[POWER GENERATOR]
[ABDUCTION : 4ENGI]--------------------------------------------------		
									[HEAVY WEAPONS PLATFORM]			[INTERROGATE ALIEN]
[UFO CRASH]----------------------------------------------------------		
>need 4 nav																	
									[3SHIVS]								
									[KEY]								[OUTSIDER SHARD]
[BASE ASSAULT]-------------------------------------------------------
									[LAB]								[FIGHTER CRAFT]
									[POWER GENERATOR]
									[LIFT]
[COUNCIL REPORT]
									[WORKSHOP]
[optional : UFO CRASH]
(if need computers)												
									[HOVER SHIV]						[EMP]
									[FIRESTORM]
									[EMP]								[HYPERWAVE BEACON]
									[HYPERWAVE RELAY]
																		[AUTOPSY]
[OVERSEER]
									[PSY LABS]							[ETHERAL DEVICE]
									[GOLLOP CHAMBER]
									[PSY SOLDIER]
[FINAL MISSION]

the third lift, and my overall facility management may not be optimal, but money doesnt seem to be much an issue.
I may be interested to help you on your segmented run, I'll contact you on twitch.

I started to learn your route, it's going ok in the first half, I manage to put down the overseer and succeed the mission, but the time it takes to get a firestorm ready, emp cannon, all the research, the 4th council comes up and GAME OVER.

Is the route that tight and the RNG screwed me a little ? Or do you manage to complete the game before the 4th council ?
Anyway, I'll keep trying, I'd love to see the sub 2h run, or any complete run, to see what I'm doing wrong.

If you're not at 4ufo's computers by the base assault, do you reset, or do an extra UFO after ? (that's what I went for so far, doesn't seem to matter to complete the game. It's maybe an extra mission, and big time loss... So here is the route I'm following, any comment ?

[code]
[MISSION]							[ENGINEERING]						[RESEARCH]

[INTRO]--------------------------------------------------------------
									[EXCAVATE]							[XENO-BI0LOGY]
[ABDUCTION : 4ENGI]--------------------------------------------------		
									[WORKSHOP]								
									[SATELLITES x2]							
									[EXCAVATE]							[ARC THROWER]
[UFO CRASH]----------------------------------------------------------		
									[SATELLITE UPLINK]					
[ABDUCTION : 200$]---------------------------------------------------								
									[ALIEN CONTAINEMENT]					
									[POWER GENERATOR]					[ALIEN MATERIALS]
									[LIFT]									
																								
[COUNCIL REPORT]														[EXPERIMENTAL WARFARE]
									[EXCAVATE]								
									[FOUNDRY]								
									>has to be finished before the 15th		
									[ARC THROWER]							
									[2 PHOENIX CANNON]																				
									[LABS]
									[POWER GENERATOR]
[ABDUCTION : 4ENGI]--------------------------------------------------		
									[HEAVY WEAPONS PLATFORM]			[INTERROGATE ALIEN]
[UFO CRASH]----------------------------------------------------------		
>need 4 nav																	
									[3SHIVS]								
									[KEY]								[OUTSIDER SHARD]
[BASE ASSAULT]-------------------------------------------------------
									[LAB]								[FIGHTER CRAFT]
									[POWER GENERATOR]
									[LIFT]
[COUNCIL REPORT]
									[WORKSHOP]
[optional : UFO CRASH]
(if need computers)												
									[HOVER SHIV]						[EMP]
									[FIRESTORM]
									[EMP]								[HYPERWAVE BEACON]
									[HYPERWAVE RELAY]
																		[AUTOPSY]
[OVERSEER]
									[PSY LABS]							[ETHERAL DEVICE]
									[GOLLOP CHAMBER]
									[PSY SOLDIER]
[FINAL MISSION]
	[/code]

the third lift, and my overall facility management may not be optimal, but money doesnt seem to be much an issue. 
I may be interested to help you on your segmented run, I'll contact you on twitch.