XCOM: Enemy Unknown is a turn based strategy game developed by Firaxis for PC, XBOX 360 and Playstation 3.
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Is it possible to keep all sixteen countries in the XCOM coalition?
I'm on my third XCOM campaign (normal difficulty) in an attempt to keep any countries from quitting the coalition and it is very clearly not working. My troops are strong enough to handle the early ...
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Does alien tech scale with time in XCOM: Enemy Unknown?
If I forgo completing the Alien Base Assault mission for a few game months, will the aliens advance as well, making the mission harder?
I realize incidental missions get more difficult and scale, but ...
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What is the range and success rate on the Arc Thrower?
I'm ready to capture my first Alien, but I'm not certain what the range and success rate of the Arc Thrower is. I'm playing on Ironman, so I can't really afford to experiment to find out in the middle ...
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Question on the last mission of XCOM: Enemy Unknown
How do you get a psionic soldier who's powerful enough to use the chamber that you've built?
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What determines if a soldier is gifted with psionic powers?
The game mentions a soldier's will influencing whether they have a gift or not. Since you can only test a soldier once, does that mean promoting a soldier a couple of times before testing might ...
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Can you tell what enemies your soldiers would be able to see/fire on before moving?
When moving, XCOM provides a helpful blue line indicating what path your soldier will take. This is extremely helpful to see BEFORE you move, in situations like:
When you're trying to sneak up on ...
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How do soldiers advance their psionic skill?
What is needed for a soldier to advance his/her psionic abilities?
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Is it possible to close doors in X-Com: Enemy Unknown?
I know left-click would open a closed door without making too much sound, lifting some fog of war. Is there a way to close them back, giving yourself some tactical defense in protection-type missions? ...
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Where's this “Unit Analysis View”?
When I finish an autopsy, the research report ends with
We may be able to gain further insight into this creature's unique abilities in combat if another specimen is targeted in the field in the ...
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in XCOM how do I fire or choose another soldier
I just got myself the new XCOM, started the singleplayer campagin and went through the first mission, got back to HQ and made some choices and then comes the second mission.
Player is directed to ...
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How do I select Mission Control? (Tutorial)
I'm playing through the tutorial for XCOM.
I've just told the Research Labs to build the alien zapper, and it tells me to "go to mission control".
However, I keep clicking on the button and nothing ...
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What are all of the priority missions needed to complete the game?
I just finished assaulting the alien base. I feel like I'm getting close to the end of the game, though, and I don't like it when the ending comes up abruptly with no warning. How many priority ...
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Can the assault unit use the Arc Thrower after run and gun?
I currently have a support unit using my only arc thrower, but I am wondering if I can give it to the assualt unit so I can close the gap with run and gun (or what the real name of the skill is) then ...
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Is it possible to hit your own men with normal weapons?
I know you can damage your own men with rockets and grenades, but when firing your regular weapon is it possible to cause friendly fire?
I've had a few situations where two troops were close together ...
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Are some enemy types missable?
I assaulted the alien base and killed the sectoid commander. Shortly after that I shot down the overseer ship and made the game progress forwards. Now I never see any sectoid commanders and instead ...
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How does critical chance work?
When does the critical hit calculation take place?
Does a critical hit guarantee that my shot will strike its target, or is a critical hit chance only calculated if a shot hits the target in the ...
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What are the percentages above the alien icon?
When a unit sees an alien, an alien icon appears on the bottom right corner of the screen. When the mother hovers over it a percentage appears. The percentage is sometimes different from the chance to ...
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What does the full research tree look like?
I find myself constantly wishing I had some idea what the research tree looked like. For example, if I want to unlock plasma weapons, do I have to go down the laser weapon path first to unlock it, or ...
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What is an “X-Ray”?
The soldiers are always going on about x-rays, but I have no idea what they're talking about. What is an x-ray?
A lot of times, they'll mention x-rays when I kill an alien, but I think I've heard ...
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What unlocks the ability to build a workshop?
I've been playing on Classic and one thing I've found is that I need to get a jump start on Satellite Uplinks so that I can keep the panic level under control. However, to build them, I need 10 ...
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What affects manufacturing costs?
I've been noticing that as I progress through my game on Classic Ironman, the cost for me to manufacture satellites keeps going down. It was §100 when I started the game, at another point it was §78, ...
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Soldiers stuck as wounded?
In my barracks there are some soldiers that just say "wounded" without "(x days)", some of them have been like that for weeks without any change.
How can i get them back? is this a bug or something ...
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How long do crashed UFO's last?
I shot down a UFO, but a few of my "must have" soldiers are recovering from wounds. I would like to send them in 4 days, or 2 if I had to. Will the crash site disappear or otherwise go bad if I wait ...
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Are there additional benefits to fielding max-rank soldiers?
One of my soldiers is rapidly approaching Colonel, the highest rank. Once he gets there, is there any incentive to keep bringing him for missions, apart from the obvious advantage of having a strong ...
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How do you edit a unit's nickname?
In the Customize screen the "nickname" editing button is disabled for me. How do I make it become active?
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How do you flank an enemy?
What conditions must be met for an enemy to count as flanked? Is the same true for the enemy to flank you?
Usually, it means that you have soldiers on either side of the enemy, but I've seen enemies ...
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What are the advantages of flanking an enemy?
What bonuses do I get when I flank an enemy? What bonuses does the enemy get when he flanks me? Are they the same?
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Is it possible to free target and shoot your weapon?
In the original X-Com you could basically point your weapon any direction and fire it. You could shoot buildings, vegetation, and even your own men. If you had a strong enough weapon you could shoot ...
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How can I remove mind control from my soldier?
My one soldier who carries an arc caster just got mind controlled by the enemy. I would really like to capture this enemy rather than kill it, as I suspect I could learn a lot from it. How can I make ...
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Are the hit percentages predetermined?
I was playing a Terror mission last night where after my unit would enter an area, a Cyber Disc and two Drones would come around the corner of a building. All four of my other units were in a position ...
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How does “hearing” work?
Sometimes when I'm approaching an alien-infested area but haven't made contact yet, I'll get a notification from one of my soldiers that they can hear something. This is accompanied by a visual ...
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When does the game auto-save in Ironman mode?
Sometimes, if I force quit and reload, I can get lucky and undo an unfortunate misclick. Other times, I'm stuck with the outcome that happened the first time.
When exactly does the game save during ...
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How does enemy progression work?
As I play the game, I notice that eventually tougher enemies show up. From what I've read, it sounds like this is based on elapsed time rather than "research checkpoints", but I haven't seen any ...
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What does steam do?
When excavating and building structures, some tiles have 'steam'. This causes the excavation to be more expensive. What other effects does it have?
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What do the Muton abilities do?
Mutons are large green troops that tend to carry plasma rifles and grenades. Often I see them use two abilities. Intimidate and Blood Call.
What are the effects of Intimidate and Blood Call?
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How do I effectively combat a cyberdisc?
Currently, I am battling three cyberdiscs on a terror mission. Cyberdiscs appear to have very powerful weaponry and they shift into different forms.
What gear and abilities are best used to combat ...
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What bonuses do you receive for being elevated?
Reading through the Sniper skill tree, I saw the following:
Damn Good Ground: Confers +10 Aim and +10 Defense against enemies at
lower elevation, in addition to the usual elevation bonuses.
...
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How do I capture a drone?
One of the enemies in the game is a small floating four-pronged claw. Despite my best efforts, I do not seem to be able to use the Arc Thrower against one.
Is it possible to capture a drone? If so, ...
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What penalties do reaction shots receive?
I was looking through the Sniper skill tree and saw this skill:
Opportunist: Eliminates the Aim penalty on reaction shots, and allows
reaction shots to cause critical hits.
Until reading that, ...
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Do I still get a free satellite if I skip the tutorial?
My first game was Classic Ironman, and things went pretty well for a while. I got a free satellite at some point during the tutorial and even managed to survive for a few missions afterwards! Then all ...
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What alien bits should I sell?
I've got a considerable amount of alien detritus lying around my base:
Some items, like the damaged UFO flight computer, are marked as useless and intended for sale without consequence.
However, ...
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Is the ability to change armor color only available to preorders in XCOM: Enemy Unknown?
Can armor color only be changed if you have a preordered version of XCOM?
On the customization screen I can change hair, face, name, etc, but I can't change the color of the armor.
UPDATE: Seems ...
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Difference between S.H.I.V.'s
So I have three options for SHIVs and I am not sure which to choose. There is the normal shiv which seems like its just inferior to the other two, there is the alloy shiv which is mobile cover and ...
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What are the proximity bonuses for adjacent buildings and when do they apply?
The game makes it clear that labs and workshops get a bonus when built next to buildings of the same type. I've also seen it written online that Satellite Uplinks get a bonus but I can't see anywhere ...
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Can I get a country back into XCOM program?
I am playing XCOM - Enemy Unknown on Classic difficulty. In the first month, Australia quit the XCOM program. Due to the lack of money and fitting missions, I could not do too much to decrease the ...
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Just how long does the 'tutorial' actually last?
I've been contemplating restarting and skipping the 'tutorial' so that I can choose my base layout, go through the first mission without losing 3 units, that whole thing, but, now that I've done a few ...
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What is the best way to take out a sectopod?
I just ran into my first sectopod map today and it utterly destroyed me.
From what I can tell, it had a long range aoe attack and a super deadly beam cannon. The little drones hovering around it and ...
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How do I play the Interceptor/UFO minigame?
I heard that the Interceptor/UFO sequence is a minigame yet there was no tutorial. Is it a minigame? What are the controls and rules...?!
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When do smoke grenade defense bonuses apply?
Smoke grenades state that they give a +20 to defense to anyone in the smoke (friend or enemy).
However, if someone has to trace a line of sight through smoke to a target on the other side who is not ...
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What is the point of using interceptors to attack UFOs?
I understand most of what's going on in XCOM: Enemy Unknown, but I don't quite get what Interceptors are for. I know that when I Scan for Satellite Activity, I can come across a UFO, and then scramble ...
