Definitely. The new ADVENT types are pretty hardcore, especially Gunners who have a cannon that does 7-8 damage which is nuts. Seekers overwatch at the end of their turn almost all the time and can manually use Covering Fire. Drones aren't a big deal. Haven't encountered enough of the other aliens to tell if they're that strong but I'm guessing hell yes.

Guess its time to give up ironman and prepare to get rekt

The new types aren't too bad, but I feel like they appear way too early. Sentries in particular seem to have Ready for Anything from day one, and nearly as much aim as a captain, plus an extra HP over the troopers. They are VERY difficult for rookies to deal with. Captains seem to carry grenades from day one as well now which is harsh.

Coming from A Better Advent, I'm not noticing a significant rise in difficulty, though there is certainly some new tactics to be had. I'm liking the additional variety, though I'll agree they show up quite quickly.

So far my experience has been that you need to prioritize having a grenade ready to break Overwatch on the Sentries, and focus down Gunners and Naja due to their high-damage weapons being auto-kills before Plated. Naja in particular are good shots aside from packing nasty guns and they've got Squadsight, so DON'T let them run off. I've yet to see an ADVENT Engineer use it's launcher, so I'm not sure if they're bugged. Drones can almost be ignored. They look scary with the flying and the two armor and the four HP, but their weapons are crap. I hacked one and checked it out, Stunner is the only decent move they have, and they haven't got Holo-targeting anymore.

Harder, yes.

This mod appears to be half-cooked and needs some tuning.
Things like drones early on are kind of cool since they legitimately add something new to the early game that isn't just "they shoot a gun and then you die".

Unfortunately most things after drones -gunners, najas, sidewinders, whatever- are reskinned gundudes with overtuned stats that don't really make things more interesting and feel more like filler, especially visually. You can barely tell the viper variants apart.

lol. My guys are coming back on the sky ranger chewed the flip up. Love it. No more flawless victories for now.

The Shawdow chamber preview is worrying now. lol

Originally posted by Inventor Raccoon:

Definitely. The new ADVENT types are pretty hardcore, especially Gunners who have a cannon that does 7-8 damage which is nuts. Seekers overwatch at the end of their turn almost all the time and can manually use Covering Fire. Drones aren't a big deal. Haven't encountered enough of the other aliens to tell if they're that strong but I'm guessing hell yes.

that's nothing compared to the Naja which has a plasma sniper rifle and can do clsoe to 10 damage and shoot at you from the shadows as they have a better line of site in my experience.

Naja are 9-10 I believe, at least on Legend, 80 aim, and they have Squadsight.

Originally posted by d_valroth:

Naja are 9-10 I believe, at least on Legend, 80 aim, and they have Squadsight.

ahh that explains it! Nasty damage when I still had conventional weapons.

I really wish I had found this thread before trying this mod. Was expecting "more variety," not "aliens will kick your teeth in."

I tried playing this "vanilla" XCOM soldiers. No perk mods, squad cap increase, new weapons, etc. Just playing on Veteran, too. On average I was losing a soldier every two missions, and I don't just mean rookies and squaddies, either. Finally around the time I started researching tier 3 weapons, a sniping viper and a giant cryssalid killed three of my best soldiers in a single mission (two of those killed from full health in a single turn by a single enemy) and I gave up. So I guess what I'm saying is, this mod is definitely a buff for the aliens, not just "variety." I recommend it only to those willing to also use mods to buff XCOM, or to masochists.

When using Vanilla Team XCOM, some of the aliens just seem absurdly unfair, what with one-shotting your soldiers while they're in full cover, or stunning them for two full turns. The stuns I was able to deal with until that last mission, but the assassinations ... yeesh.

This mod is intended as a compliment to the perk pack. It's also tuned towards Long War balance, not vanilla. Even Legend is pretty easy once you get the tricks down, so these guys really test your game knowledge.

I'm a XCOM Long War vet and I don't care how good somebody claims they are, my first mission after gatecrasher was unwinnable with this mod installed; it needs work. I have legend difficult with all LW mods installed (no ABA, no other difficulty or AI mods, but I did have Shotguns for All Classes installed and equipped everyone with shotguns). I got the 'protect the device' mission which they started beating on at turn one. I killed the first pod easily of course, breaking concealment, then quickly proceeded to engage the second pod which were beating on the device. That was ok but then a third pod happened to show up (no, I didn't run around, it came to me). I was able clean up the second pod but then the fourth pod showed up (again, it casually came to me) and then the reinforcements flare was sent. At this point one of my guys was panicking from a Sectoid mind attack and one was stunned from one of those floating bots. The enemies also had time to consistently beat on the device, sometimes attacking it twice in a turn. The reinforcements that came were...get ready for this...TWO stun lancers and another captain. They first focus fired and killed the device (which I had ZERO chance of saving) then quickly cleaned me up. There was no hope.

No one could have won that, at least without sacrificing the device, which really isn't an option if you want a chance in hell to win Legend. This is beyond ridiculous difficultly at mission #2.

The LW mods seem to not only increase difficulty and variety of aliens but also add more of them. I think that a starting squad of six is mandatory for this setup unless you are playing non-ironman or bronzeman. In addition, some buffs are also required like 'Shotguns for all Classes'.

That sounds like a glitch. There shouldn't be that many pods on the second mission.

Originally posted by d_valroth:

That sounds like a glitch. There shouldn't be that many pods on the second mission.

I restarted a campaign and the second one had four as well but without reinforcements. I didn't get stunlancers and it was a very possible mission. I think this is not due to LW it's actually due to Legend.