Many Welps

We seem to be in a much better spot than the last time I was in command. The pips on the Avatar Project have been greatly reduced and we have a much better supply of resources and…supplies. There wasn’t a whole lot to do on the Avenger. The Shadow Chamber was working on a project decoding data fragments from the last Codex experiment which took up all other research.

Without much to do on the ship I went to go check out the Geoscape situation. With the Avatar Project progress reduced for now I felt like I had a few more options this time around. Eastern Europe needed contacted and we were just under the required amount of Intel. West Asian had a Life signs location that also awarded intel so I flew the Avenger over than to scan. Halfway through my 4 day scan the Shadow Chamber project completed.

From the Shadow Chamber project, we learned that the alien overseers known as the Elders have a gnarly medical condition that makes their muscles rapidly atrophy. They’ve been scooping up species from the worlds they visit trying to find a cure. They’ve stopped on Earth to see if there’s something in humans that might be able to cure them.

So that’s nice. Nothing like a little Alien/Human experimentation am I right?

Tygan has given us a new objective: Use the skulljack on a codex to breach the alien network. This has also opened up available research slots now that the Shadow Chamber work is done for now. I opted for the alien data cache research to boos our intel supply. When that was completed there was an opportunity to have the Archon Autopsy research which I took. That gave our Rangers a nice weapons upgrade for their machetes. After that I began researching powered armor, I have a feeling we’re going to need it sooner rather than later.

One of our main objectives was to upgrade the Shadow Chamber. We had enough resources so I kicked that off. Engineering then informed me we were out of power capacity. A room just opened up so I set out to build another power relay.

Over in the Geoscape I was able to finish scanning for the intel and even made it down south to collect some more supplies. With enough intel in hand I popped on over to East Europe to make contact and that’s when the new mission arrive.

Honestly, I think that’s the longest I’ve gone in the Geoscape portion before a mission alert.

Operation Walking Spider

I was worried going in to this mission since the difficulty was “Very Difficult”. On top of that it’s also an extract the VIP type mission and the few of those I’ve done have had some nasty surprises the closer I got to extraction. I was very much hoping our high level soldiers would carry me to victory so I assembled the best we had available.

As it turns out, the mission itself wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. It started off with a Codex and two ADVENT soldiers. I had Rakuno shove the skulljack into it’s head and hacked the alien network. Magi and Endalia took care of the codex afterwards while Black Widow and Bookahnerk took out the ADVENT soilders.

So far so good. I started advancing forward a little and that’s when this guy showed up.

The cutscene hyped this new alien type up. After one round of playing ring-around-the-rosie while it teleported around the building we were on top of and a bit on Mind Control shenanigans the squad made short work of it.

With no enemies in sight, I started moving the squad and the VIP up towards extractions. I pushed Rankuno up just a bit too far from everyone and was spotted by 2 vipers and a Gatekeeper. Magi picked off the two Vipers leaving Naithan and Rankuno the only ones close enough to deal with the Gatekeeper.

This is the first time I’ve encountered this enemy type. I have to say I was a bit worried when it started resurrecting people to fight for it. Rankuno got a full clip into this thing and had. it on the ropes. Looking to finish it off I sent Naithan to wack it with the new and imporved Fusion Blade.

It apparently explodes when it dies. Sorry Naithin…I somehow always manage to get your character injured.

After the explosion Naithan and Rankuno were sitting at half health but no enemies to be seen. The squad made one more push to extraction. At this point, I was expecting something real bad to show up. maybe a Sectopod or something. But all that was waiting for us an ADVENT Officer and two soldiers. Easily the least threatening group of the mission.

Endalia and Maji picked off the solider and Bookanerk took down the officer and we all everyone made it out.

Aftermath

Overall the mission went as smooth as it could have. You wouldn’t know it by looking at the return screen though. Unfortunately, that little Gatekeeper self destruct incident leaves Naithan Wounded for 5 Days anmd Rakuno Gravely Wounded for 8 days.

Endalia did receive a promotion though! I went with the Serial perk which refunds an action for every kill made with a Sniper Rifle. It seemed better than Fan Fire which just lets you fire the pistol 3 times at a target.

We even got a bit of loot and a shiny new Avatar Corpse. I’m sure Tygan is just dying to do the autopsy on that one.

Up next is UnwiseOwl, good luck commander!