Part 21: Operation Panicked Drink
Operation Panicked Drink
Polsy
Hey, remember that guy with the briefcase that had something important in it that was never explained? Let's go see what is going on with that. Not that it will be explained here either! Here is Confounding Light, the second mission in the Slingshot DLC. It's a very unique map that was very difficult when it was released, and seems to have been buffed in alien count since Enemey Within.
The map comes with two main sources of difficulty. The first is the large number of aliens. There are lots of Thin Men through out the map, almost guaranteeing someone will get poisoned, often multiple people. In addition to the Thin Men are air drops of Mutons. Often times this mission will pop up in the second month of the game, where players are more likely to have laser weapons OR armor, not both. That the mission came out mid month three helps me out tremendously, allowing me to have better equipped soldiers and higher ranked soldiers than I'd otherwise have expected to tackle this mission with.
The other big source of difficulty comes from the ten turn time limit. There is a lot of ground to cover in this map and the large number of aliens means plenty of possible delays while your soldiers are stuck fighting aliens rather than advancing up the train. Along with bomb missions this one of the few maps that force me out of my defensive style of play. Picking the best terrain and high cover before engaging in a firefight isn't an option in this situation. Every turn progress needs to be made forward. Even if it's just a single move and shooting. Falling behind will put you behind the clock and force risky actions or mission failure.
An additional complication comes from Geoscape concerns. Any soldiers that are wounded in this mission are not likely to be ready to take part in the third and final mission of SlingShot. The last mission usually activates within two days, and sometimes much less time. The next Slingshot mission is a fairly long and dangerous mission with a lot of aliens, it demands a strong team to complete with out taking losses, and having your better soldiers sitting in the sickbay from wounds taken on this mission will really hurt your chances of cleanly completing the follow up mission.
Repair Servos vs Expanded Storage
An interesting choice between two utility skills. Repair Servos confer a little bit of regeneration to the Mec while Expanded Storage increased ammo capacity of the MECs main gun and it's optional build ons, not affecting the punchy fist or flame thrower.
Repair Servos
+ 2 Health Regen at the start of your turn.
- Only heals a total of 6 HP a map.
Expanded Storage
+ Increases the ammo capacity of the MECs main weapon, grenade launcher, mine launcher, and healing mist module.
- Doesn't expand Flame Thrower ammo.
Both of these are good options. Repair Servos would look a lot better to me if the total amount of healing from it wasn't limited so low. At 6HP it's not much to make me consider it. 6 HP is one use of an improved medkit, of which I'm likely to have a minimum of three on my squad at any time. If it had a higher limit to the healing per map, or maybe healed 1 HP a turn but had no limit to it then I think it'd be a stronger choice between the two. As is though, I'm not going to fret over 6 HP very much, less if the MEC has Healing Mist equipped. However the one thing I always complain about early MECs is how limited the ammo for their main weapon is. Two shots is not enough ammo for the MECs guns at all. The expanded capacity for other features, the grenades, mines, and healing mist, is a really nice kicker on top of solving the biggest complaint I have with MECs.