XCOM Journey to Ironman: The set-up

It's a God-awful small affair 

My name is- well it's not important,- but I have a confession to make: I have never completed a Classic or Higher Ironman run of the XCOM games. Now I'm sure that's a distinction I likely share with a good many other people in the world today, however for someone who loves the modern XCOM series as much as I do, and who owns every single game in said series, it's a bit of a misnomer. It's kind of like claiming to love the Lord of the Rings franchise but only having read the Hobbit, or even worse, only having watched the films of the Hobbit. It just don't roll like that. Somewhere along the line you've either held yourself back or bought into your own lie. And for a very long time, I'll admit: I was scared. As much as I like hard games, I've never really been one for the games that step on those pressure points and ride up the anxiety to stupid degrees. The games that make you so stressed that you aren't even having fun anymore. That's how I was. Nowadays I reached the point where I don't care so much about being stressed, stress can't do anything to me that I would be afraid of, so I'm going to put it on the line to deepen my conviction to a series I love. Somehow, someway; I am going to best at least XCOM Enemy Unknown on Classic difficulty with Ironman ticked on. (And then I guess I'll do marathon mode, or install Long War, or something. I don't know yet.)

But just so that I can bring everyone up to speed, like those who just read what I wrote and said "huh?" XCOM Enemy Unknown is a video game that is built upon turn-based squad-tactics and strategic planning with life or death consequences. Its a series renowned for being tough to the point of impenetrability to most who don't take it seriously, and the modern games all feature a 'classic' difficulty setting which is said to match the tough-as-nails unforgiving nature of those originals. (There is a higher difficulty mode in 'impossible', but I don't wanna talk about that now. Babysteps.) Ironman mode, sometimes referred to as 'the way XCOM is meant to be played' denotes a mode wherein players are given access to a single save file, from which they cannot load with exiting. And it's also a file which saves automatically whenever you quit. Ironman mode is basically a check which ensures that mistakes have irrecoverable consequences on the battlefield because save scumming becomes impossible. (Save Scumming: Reloading a save point over and over so that you can retry a section for more favourable results.) Ironman is basically XCOM with the training wheels off, and it has terrified me for as long as I've played the XCOM series.

Just to be clear, I have completed all the modern XCOM games on Classic difficulty: it's my goto play method because anything lower just feels cheap and lets me plough through everything. (With an exception to 'War of the Chosen' because I just haven't gotten around to completing that playthrough yet. I really do enjoy the expansion though; it's an incredibly transformative upgrade from base XCOM 2) But when I get to the point of playing these games in a state where consequences are irreversible I get to feeling the ole blood pressure rising. As my familiarity with the series has grown, I've left behind traditional save scumming (Which got me through my old console playthrough of Enemy Unknown) and have moved onto a system I'm mostly happy with where I keep one save file that I update at the beginning of every mission. That way, when I restart it's just so that I can retry my strategy in the same scenario rather than in order to retry fate over and over hoping to break through the clouds. But... darn it's just not enough. 

So here I am, dedicating myself to the stupid task of attacking Ironman XCOM and completing it sometime before my stress boils over into my blood pressure and gives me a brain aneurysm. (Although, to be completely honest with you: That outcome might be the good ending out of this whole affair. It would save me a lot of headache.) Or rather, here I am informing you that I've already dedicated myself to this stupid task, because I've been at it for the last week now and I'm here with my tail between my legs to report; it's uh... it's not going so well. Yeah, I've run into some snags. But I've written it down here which means I'm committed to getting it done and you are absolutely un-allowed to bring up my other unfinished projects on here because I said so.

The last week has been taken up mostly with what I've referred to as 'training', but in reality turned out to be little more than a undeserved ego boost before a series of embarrassing faceplants. So I went ahead and played through XCOM enemy Unknown twice on Ironman setting, first on Easy and then on Normal, (Difficulties that I had actually never played this game on before) thinking it would prepare me. And in a way it did. For the metagame process of designing an XCOM command that's capable of surviving the curve of enemy aliens getting thrown at me, I am actually rather well practiced. Both playthroughs had me reaching the end with no countries lost and a greater appreciation for, not just dealing with mistakes, but not even making them in the first place. (And yet I knew from the getgo that I would get a little bit lazy due to the Officer Training School that both difficulties give you free for some unknown reason.) The real limitation with this 'training' was with the aspect of the game they were meant to help me with; the actual battles.

I thought that playing through the game twice on Ironman would familiarise me with the peril of living in a world with consequences, but all it did was hardcode into my mind some nonsense that making a mistake and getting blindsided by a Sectoid isn't a death sentence. (Newsflash: it absolutely is) In fact, just the plain process of going through the game twice and upgrading soldiers through levelling and armour resulted in me becoming reckless in my easy playthroughs! There were several late-game examples where I had to literally drag a character out of an encounter because they had 1 hp! That shouldn't be happening on Ironman, but I'm the idiot that would leave them in the middle of an ambush between two Sectopods and a Chryssalid! (I'm exaggerating, of course. So far I've only ever seen two Sectopods in the final Temple ship assault, and nowhere near the Chryssalid section) In fact, on the final battle of my Normal Ironman playthrough I literally let three out of my six squadmates die on the final turn. I mean sure, it didn't really matter from that point, but that's neglect of a whole 'nother level! (Coming from my mind)

But that was over the course of four days, how have the next three days been? In the words of Clubber Lane from Rocky 3: "Pain." I made it past month 1 once, and I did that with a monthly finance of -15 credits and with the Untied States having just pulled out of the XCOM agreement... on Month 1... I didn't even know it could get that bad. I've tried again and again, and I think I'm getting better, I hope I am, but I still have a long way to go. One trick I've picked up from helpful guides on the Internet (besides the freakin' obvious that some try to offer up like nuggets of golden wisdom) is to, whenever possible, decide the battle ground. Activate groups of enemies by walking into them, then retreat all of your troops into favourable firing positions. That's worked sometimes. But then I end up losing an entire squad later and just abandon that save file. (I like to think of it as 'abandoning that timeline' from my days playing 'Into the Breach')

So I guess that means this becomes my very first challenge blog series, as I try to push myself to achieve a stupid task for stupid reasons because I hate myself. Won't you read along with my folly? I'll be trying to turn my adventure into a vaguely entertaining story as best as I can do, as I slowly learn how to transition from a commander who autopilots fights whilst binge-watching Doctor Phil. (That is the actually reason why I lost three guys in the finale last time) to a razor-sharp tactician who can outwit his way around any sneaky grey who comes his way! Or at the very least, one who gets lucky enough to limp through the first two months so that the real game can begin. With any luck this series will be two blogs long. (It won't be.) If you're an XCOM player with any hints for a moron; please hit me up. I'm desperate.