I'm glad you're coming to the conclusion that the MARS is obsolete, because from my perspective they're just a money pit. They're inflexible, only moderately armored/armed, don't gain exp, and can't be healed mid-mission, which makes them strictly worse than your soldiers, especially the shields. The one place I do see them as being useful would be in a VERY different role, which is as a back-line demolitions-focused unit that exists purely for opening lines of fire for the rest of the team.
I can definitely agree with most of this. I use my MARS in a similar way, mostly as obstruction clearing. It spends most of its time in the front though, and with the alloy armor it’s lasted through several missions. It’s great for quick recon, plowing through walls to check houses so I don’t spend a turn looking through an empty house. The wall destruction is also very necessary on some missions. Shield units can’t jump walls, and on some maps entire areas are walled off with low walls without any doors. One of the nice things about the MARS though is how they, assuming they survive, are instantly repaired with no healing time.
Shield guys are very useful. They absorb a lot of damage and let you to be more aggresive with the rest of the team. The role of the MARS unit is obsolete in my opinion. You can use a Shield guy and it is way cheaper.
In Milestone 4 there are multiple weapons and armour upgrades for the MARS. I hate to say it but M4 is the first actual iteration of X2 that feels like the actual game. It's also WAY harder, if you can believe that. lol
It is indeed! I always play on the hardest settings (commander) and for the first time i just had to skip a mission: the first terror mission. That thing was BRUTAL! I tried for hours, reloading and trying again... in the end, I skipped it. But the next UFO mission was piss easy again. That jump to the first terror, i think i need Gauss weapons for that!
@@annekekramer3835 I had to start at Captain and I was wiped out by cruisers after about 200 days. I also spent around 2.5-3 hours on ONE terror mission. I was forced to stay in full cover and wait for them to attack me lol
“Didn’t manage to kill them but sprayed a lot of bullets everywhere” You just say where you want the hose pointed, sir! 🫡 (results not guaranteed 😂). Feel like a huge wave of progress set up in this ep. Can’t wait to see how upgrades pay off in next one! New MARS name: BAIT-E Thanks Phros glad you’re feeling better! 🙏🏾🦾🎖
On the subject of shieldbearers with guns, since they have two weapons and will swap partway through, they maybe don't need spare ammunition. Also might check if shotguns or some other weapon might weigh less than the full assault rifle. -15 TUs is rough As always, edits and spoilers below Bit odd that the UFOs always look gently landed - if they crashed I'd expect a lot more damage to the surrounding terrain, which should be possible with the non-procedural terrain. Be a cool thing to add 13:00 I mean, the pretty much are legally-distinct Mutons, albeit with a different (and better) interpretation than the original Thanos-in-green-latex version 20:30 "Didn't manage to kill anything, but sprayed a lot of bullets everywhere" seems to be the defining feature of the LMG. Since you're swapping the MARS to a cannon, I wonder if it might be better to swap the LMG for the grenade launcher to get the cover-destroying capability back 25:54 armor is a lie, everybody can be one-shotted. Armor is only there to cover for mistakes and prevent otherwise-inevitable casualties. At least, that's how I tend to think about, albeit that's born from the original XCOM which is much more glass-cannony than Xenonauts 28:48 Oh, how many soldiers I have lost to reaction fire sending single soldiers to confirm that empty areas are in fact empty 37:41 Alien power gives you better planes I think, and plasma presumably can give you better aircraft cannons, so those are probably the priority? 40:20 Two? You've almost lost planes before with three, with two per squadron you're going to start losing planes I think
"I don't like how many of my soldiers keep dying" *Later in the mission:* "This guy has 22HP but let's place him in the UFO entrance and hopefully he can overwatch kill the enemy before he gets shot" A bold strategy, haha.
I didn't consider it when you stated you were starting to carry rifles on your shields, and they could also drop the rifle for your snipers during a UFO clear. Might add a little flexibility once in CQB.
Good for you to get back at it! The Mars seems to be…not an optimal play. The rockets are good for it but still need more blast damage. Keep checking the doors and corners, you almost got boned there by the mantid
The Machinegunners, I had some trouble with making them useful, but there is a certain very tough enemy, where they absolutely excel.(Trying not to spoil)
The MARS have done their jobs admirably so far. Would be nice if Hello World had hit anything this mission but a MARS can be rebuilt, people can't. And the MARS doesn't get more skilled with successive missions like an experienced soldier does.
New microphone is nice. Maybe bump your voice a little bit in general because I have to bump on the volume of my PC to hear you well, but other than that it's grand. Also Iiih sounds a lot like you caught the same bug I caught last month. :I Was dry coughing for weeks after all of the other symptoms went away. If you are 100% sure you are healthy then Thyme and Anise help suppress the coughing reflex. Also if you can find a tea with Malva AKA Marsh Mallow (in English, German it's Echter Eibisch, or Slovene Navadni Slez), this might be more of a central European thing to commonly find, though. All 3 of those suppress coughing a bit. Also ask your doctor for advice etc etc.
Would recommend leaving some ammo behind. It’s really just a paperweight in all but the longest of missions. Even on Abductor crash site missions I’ve never needed to reload, let alone do so twice. Many soldiers carry two reloads which are definitely not needed and could be better replaced with a grenade.
I’ve used plenty of reloads, but that’s because I tend to use MGs to clear obstacles, blast holes in wall and suppressing enemies and the full bursts quickly chew through the ammo. I also often need one reload for shotguns and sniper rifles, because they also have fairly limited ammo capacity (perhaps with a second reload, depending on the weapon tech, especially for snipers). When it comes to rifles, I tend not to use them, but with their larger ammo capacity, I guess a single reload should suffice and is probably mainly necessary if you use bursts fairly frequently. Pistols almost never require reloads, although a single one might be useful for those types of pistols that have very low ammo capacity (laser without recharging capabilities, if memory serves).
new mars names. Please No Target practice Live Bait Help Me Sacrificial Chicken I would have said lamb on the last one but chicken would be far funnier
Hey! I love this series and it's inspired me to start up my own. I'm not experience at all with video editing, recording, whatever really. I'm noticing I get pretty awful pixelation on my latest video and was wondering if you knew anything about dealing with that? I have hook rate set to the fastest, and I've tried the encoder options I have. Latest thing I've read is to send videos to an SSD so I've started doing that for my latest not uploaded instead of my big storage drive but unsure if it will make a difference. Again, love the videos.
Yo! Sorry this took so long to reply to - things have been Hectic. I had a similar problem when I switched to the new computer. What I noticed was that the frame rate in game was unlimited on the research and map screens. Check if you can limit it to 60FPS when recording (or all the time really) and it might sort your issues straight away. Let me know if it doesnt!
@@Phrosphorthat and also finding the... proper. bitrate setting... Ended up fixing the issue haha. I was adjusting the bitrate for streaming and not for recording was my issue which is incredibly embarassing lol
Maybe the new MARS robot should be called "cannon fodder"?
Plasma Bait?
gotta be thomas
You should call your next Mars.... Sean Bean because he dies everytime lol
I'm glad you're coming to the conclusion that the MARS is obsolete, because from my perspective they're just a money pit. They're inflexible, only moderately armored/armed, don't gain exp, and can't be healed mid-mission, which makes them strictly worse than your soldiers, especially the shields.
The one place I do see them as being useful would be in a VERY different role, which is as a back-line demolitions-focused unit that exists purely for opening lines of fire for the rest of the team.
I use Mars with canon turret as anti-mindcontroling unit and smokescreen deployer.
I can definitely agree with most of this. I use my MARS in a similar way, mostly as obstruction clearing. It spends most of its time in the front though, and with the alloy armor it’s lasted through several missions. It’s great for quick recon, plowing through walls to check houses so I don’t spend a turn looking through an empty house.
The wall destruction is also very necessary on some missions. Shield units can’t jump walls, and on some maps entire areas are walled off with low walls without any doors.
One of the nice things about the MARS though is how they, assuming they survive, are instantly repaired with no healing time.
Mars: "Another one" (bites the dust)
losing a person is cheaper than losing a mars.
Unless you keep thier equipment 😅
Neurosturgeon killed it this mission!
Always reliable, always on point! Thank you so much!
🎉❤🎉
hello world, goodbye world : D
Shield guys are very useful. They absorb a lot of damage and let you to be more aggresive with the rest of the team.
The role of the MARS unit is obsolete in my opinion. You can use a Shield guy and it is way cheaper.
In Milestone 4 there are multiple weapons and armour upgrades for the MARS.
I hate to say it but M4 is the first actual iteration of X2 that feels like the actual game.
It's also WAY harder, if you can believe that. lol
It is indeed! I always play on the hardest settings (commander) and for the first time i just had to skip a mission: the first terror mission. That thing was BRUTAL! I tried for hours, reloading and trying again... in the end, I skipped it. But the next UFO mission was piss easy again.
That jump to the first terror, i think i need Gauss weapons for that!
@@annekekramer3835 I had to start at Captain and I was wiped out by cruisers after about 200 days. I also spent around 2.5-3 hours on ONE terror mission. I was forced to stay in full cover and wait for them to attack me lol
“Didn’t manage to kill them but sprayed a lot of bullets everywhere” You just say where you want the hose pointed, sir! 🫡 (results not guaranteed 😂). Feel like a huge wave of progress set up in this ep. Can’t wait to see how upgrades pay off in next one! New MARS name: BAIT-E
Thanks Phros glad you’re feeling better! 🙏🏾🦾🎖
Keep up the good work. Love this series dude. Glad that you’re feeling better.🇦🇺
MIA = didn’t make it to the choppa on an extraction mission
It's hard to stay invested in this campaign with this upload schedule.
I think its only fitting that since the MARS is regularly sacrificed that it gets a fitting name
LAM-B
On the subject of shieldbearers with guns, since they have two weapons and will swap partway through, they maybe don't need spare ammunition. Also might check if shotguns or some other weapon might weigh less than the full assault rifle. -15 TUs is rough
As always, edits and spoilers below
Bit odd that the UFOs always look gently landed - if they crashed I'd expect a lot more damage to the surrounding terrain, which should be possible with the non-procedural terrain. Be a cool thing to add
13:00 I mean, the pretty much are legally-distinct Mutons, albeit with a different (and better) interpretation than the original Thanos-in-green-latex version
20:30 "Didn't manage to kill anything, but sprayed a lot of bullets everywhere" seems to be the defining feature of the LMG. Since you're swapping the MARS to a cannon, I wonder if it might be better to swap the LMG for the grenade launcher to get the cover-destroying capability back
25:54 armor is a lie, everybody can be one-shotted. Armor is only there to cover for mistakes and prevent otherwise-inevitable casualties. At least, that's how I tend to think about, albeit that's born from the original XCOM which is much more glass-cannony than Xenonauts
28:48 Oh, how many soldiers I have lost to reaction fire sending single soldiers to confirm that empty areas are in fact empty
37:41 Alien power gives you better planes I think, and plasma presumably can give you better aircraft cannons, so those are probably the priority?
40:20 Two? You've almost lost planes before with three, with two per squadron you're going to start losing planes I think
Nice breach!
The new mic is excellent
"I don't like how many of my soldiers keep dying"
*Later in the mission:*
"This guy has 22HP but let's place him in the UFO entrance and hopefully he can overwatch kill the enemy before he gets shot"
A bold strategy, haha.
I didn't consider it when you stated you were starting to carry rifles on your shields, and they could also drop the rifle for your snipers during a UFO clear. Might add a little flexibility once in CQB.
Good for you to get back at it!
The Mars seems to be…not an optimal play. The rockets are good for it but still need more blast damage.
Keep checking the doors and corners, you almost got boned there by the mantid
Frome Hello World to Goodbye Cruel World in about 15 minutes.
The Machinegunners, I had some trouble with making them useful, but there is a certain very tough enemy, where they absolutely excel.(Trying not to spoil)
Fantastic glad your back
Name Suggestion for the next Mars. (Aimbot) or (Indestructible 2)
Next MARS: "Goodbye world"
The MARS have done their jobs admirably so far. Would be nice if Hello World had hit anything this mission but a MARS can be rebuilt, people can't. And the MARS doesn't get more skilled with successive missions like an experienced soldier does.
New microphone is nice. Maybe bump your voice a little bit in general because I have to bump on the volume of my PC to hear you well, but other than that it's grand.
Also Iiih sounds a lot like you caught the same bug I caught last month. :I Was dry coughing for weeks after all of the other symptoms went away. If you are 100% sure you are healthy then Thyme and Anise help suppress the coughing reflex. Also if you can find a tea with Malva AKA Marsh Mallow (in English, German it's Echter Eibisch, or Slovene Navadni Slez), this might be more of a central European thing to commonly find, though. All 3 of those suppress coughing a bit. Also ask your doctor for advice etc etc.
Your mic is great 👍
You sound very very different; I'll have to adjust to that ;). Also get well soon!
I feel like the Mars is currently only useful for destroying cover or hitting enemies that are grouped together with the rockets.
How does Tobor sound as a new robot name?
4:10 You DO actually get an upgrade for the mars rockets, it comes from the alenium explosives tech iirc.
XENONAUTS!
Would recommend leaving some ammo behind. It’s really just a paperweight in all but the longest of missions. Even on Abductor crash site missions I’ve never needed to reload, let alone do so twice. Many soldiers carry two reloads which are definitely not needed and could be better replaced with a grenade.
I’ve used plenty of reloads, but that’s because I tend to use MGs to clear obstacles, blast holes in wall and suppressing enemies and the full bursts quickly chew through the ammo. I also often need one reload for shotguns and sniper rifles, because they also have fairly limited ammo capacity (perhaps with a second reload, depending on the weapon tech, especially for snipers).
When it comes to rifles, I tend not to use them, but with their larger ammo capacity, I guess a single reload should suffice and is probably mainly necessary if you use bursts fairly frequently.
Pistols almost never require reloads, although a single one might be useful for those types of pistols that have very low ammo capacity (laser without recharging capabilities, if memory serves).
cool new map
new mars names.
Please No
Target practice
Live Bait
Help Me
Sacrificial Chicken
I would have said lamb on the last one but chicken would be far funnier
Hey! I love this series and it's inspired me to start up my own. I'm not experience at all with video editing, recording, whatever really. I'm noticing I get pretty awful pixelation on my latest video and was wondering if you knew anything about dealing with that?
I have hook rate set to the fastest, and I've tried the encoder options I have. Latest thing I've read is to send videos to an SSD so I've started doing that for my latest not uploaded instead of my big storage drive but unsure if it will make a difference.
Again, love the videos.
Yo! Sorry this took so long to reply to - things have been Hectic. I had a similar problem when I switched to the new computer. What I noticed was that the frame rate in game was unlimited on the research and map screens. Check if you can limit it to 60FPS when recording (or all the time really) and it might sort your issues straight away. Let me know if it doesnt!
@@Phrosphorthat and also finding the... proper.
bitrate setting...
Ended up fixing the issue haha.
I was adjusting the bitrate for streaming and not for recording was my issue which is incredibly embarassing lol
0:34 🥲 o7
Idea for new MARS unit name: Glacon.aic
Doggy in the background 🐈