History Headscratchers / XComEnemyUnknown

* If you look at the Raven's in the hangar, you'll see that it has a tilt-wing mechanism similar to a V-22 Osprey, with its wing engines pointed to the ground. This suggests that Ravens have VTOL (vertical take-off and landing) capability for use in landings. As to why they don't use said ability for takeoffs, military V/STOLs (vertical/short take-off and landing) take off normally when laden with full combat loadout.

* Here's my question...why the HELL didn't they give it a nose gun? Or a tail-gun? Some sort of mounted weapon, like on a UH-60 or similar modern-day transport helicopter? The thing's big enough to house a Mark 19 grenade launcher in the nose...surely the troops being deployed from it could have used a bit of covering fire.

** I wondered the same thing... but then I played the Tank Depot mission, and even a few missed Light Plasma shots exploded a ''tank''. If the pinnacle of conventional armor tech can't protect a tank from the weapons that 70% of the aliens can outdamage, imagine what a sitting duck a huge target like the Skyranger would be. EXALT meanwhile has tons of rocket launchers. That's literally the soldiers' only lifeline out, and XCOM doesn't seem to have any replacements, so it's best to drop off soldiers and then stay out of the way.
*** Although, in associated fanfictions, I have seen Skyrangers supporting the soldiers they drop off with cannons and grenade launchers ...[[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome and often being shot down]].
*** That one of the stronger reasons ''not'' to outfit the Skyranger with guns. If the aliens go and blow up the Skyranger, they get nothing at all (apart from killing a pilot and forcing XCOM to spend a bit more of their resources, but hardly more than a standard interceptor). But if you go and equip the Skyranger with a gun, things change, and that HUGE target turns to something to be taken down... and most likely a couple of shots with a plasma pistol will do.

** Perhaps it is easier to keep things semi-secret if the Skyranger is not obviously armed. Something that looks like a transport aircraft will not attract much attention. Something that looks like an armed military aircraft without the markings of our airforce and obviously not of a types used by our airforce will attract a lot of attention. It is also possible that the council countries accept air-to-air fighters engaging alien craft in their skies and accept a squad of X-com troops acting on their soil but do not approve of them bringing air-to-ground ordanance into their airspace.

** Ground attack aircraft are even more fragile than tanks, and their airborn nature and noisy engines makes them sitting ducks.

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* The stated motivation of the aliens is to find a species that is both psionically gifted and physically strong. The Sectoids were rejected because they were physically weak, while the Mutons were rejected because they were psionically weak. The only problem is, the Ethereals have the capability to perform enormous genetic and cybernetic modification, as proven by the Thin Men and the Floaters, respectively. If they can make a snake alien look [[UncannyValley (almost)]] human, why can't they simply modify the Sectoids until they are suitably powerful for their purposes?

*** Although, in associated fanfictions, I have seen Skyrangers supporting the soldiers they drop off with cannons and grenade launchers ...[[RealityEnsues and often being shot down]].

* Why is XCOM entirely reliant on infantry and small drone vehicles? Surely main battle tanks, artillery, helicopters, and bombers would help out a lot more. I suppose I can understand why they aren't used in terror missions because they are trying to limit collateral damage to civilians, but aliens abduction and UFO capture missions don't have that excuse. For example, an Apache helicopter, even one armed with conventional earth weaponry, would probably be more effective at killing aliens than six infantrymen would.

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** Well there's apparently [[spoiler: a BiggerBad coming, and the Uber Ethereal was counting on humanity's assistance against it. Killing it and destroying the Temple Ship may have been our NiceJobBreakingItHero moment.]]

** General Van Doorn will always say he's never seen your kind of gear before. The equipment you have is far from accessable if a UN official's never seen it. Not to mention that the rest of Van Doorn's unit sounds like it was rather easily obliterated by the thin men, so conventional weapons and training just isn't enough to take down an alien squqd.

*** That he remains under control if of course nice, but the real, long-term problem is that anything that gives you a rush, is potentially addictive (ask any expert on addiction). So you are potentially making him an addict to killing, and people standing near him addicted to watching him kill. As long as there are plenty of aliens to kill this might not be much of a problem but when these people have to spend a lot of time out of combat or when peace comes...

*** This, pretty much. XCOM probably does have some concerns about the modifications possibly having some addictive qualities, but those are ignored because the tactical applications outweigh the drawbacks, and there's the issue of the massive alien invasion ongoing at the moment. They can deal with any addiction issues or psychoses resulting from the modification ''after'' all of humankind has been saved. And that is ''if'' it actually has addictive properties and actually has a violent or dangerous impact on the soldier's metal state, which is never indicated in-game.

** The Sectoids have already been modified about as far as they can take them. What we see in-game is about the extent to which even the Ethereals' extreme genetic technology can take the Sectoid species and still have it be useful. Also keep in mind that the Uber Ethereal points out the limitations of the Sectoids were physical and mental, and unable to be overcome: frailness and cowardice, which ocmbined to make them cruel, and thus useless. Apparently, all their experimentation just resulted in a smart but brutal and cowardly species, which was entirely unsuitable for their purposes.

** The MEC trooper's brain is likely used as a wetware CPU for the suit, which takes up a lot of "processing power". Brain functions less vital in a combat situation (like emotion) are probably suppressed during that time to make room for the piloting the MEC. Outside the suit the troopers are probably "normal".

*** X-COM isn't military, they're paramilitary.

[[folder: XCom Base Security]]

* Here's something that's been getting me. Look at the XCom Base Security Personnel. They're rookies with stock assault rifles. While in Gameplay terms, this basically means you have bullet sponges for the assault, in lore terms, this makes absolutely no sense. EXALT is constantly trying to pick away at XCom, Aliens are all over the place and eventually break in. They're aware of this, and yet, as they create more and more technology, they don't think to at least arm their personnel with at least laser weaponry? Not only are these conventional firearms basically spitting thumbtacks at the aliens, if anyone internally were to snap due to the intensive genetic/physical modifications or stress, they'd essentially be useless.

** By the time this troper was in the base invasion, there were MECs, and plasma weaponry on XCom's side. Now, unless the weapons are sold, why don't they just use the spares you made? The expensive point is fair enough, but they more than have the resources by the time the event happens, to justify laser weaponry in the hands of the security personnel.

** Likely beyond the scope of this, but here goes. A great opportunity was potentially missed to expand the available "tiers" of weapons, so that your troops don't have the best guns they're ever going to get by mid-game. Say, "Basic Laser" (uses alien knowledge but earthly materials), "Improved Laser (uses alien materials, and when you have it, all ballistic weapons are replaced with basic laser weapons), and maybe even "Basic" and "Improved" plasma weapons along the same lines. Then you could have had the XCom base personnel all carrying basic laser weapons, if you had enough tech researched.

*** OK, but XCOM's purpose is reverse-engineering alien tech, and even the most basic UFOs have the same capabilities as the Skyranger. Even if they can't build another Skyranger, they should be able to build something like it at some point in the game.

** It's disappointing there weren't a few more missions that you could assault other bases and pick up more items & things like meld.

** Yes. Remeber that before this [[spoiler:she mind controlled a large majority of the XCOM staff into attacking one another during the base defense, so creating a psionic shockwave isn't completely unbelievable.]]

*** Actually no and no; there's a thing called Command Responsibility. Even if we assume that Bradford wasn't transmitting the movement orders to the team (and thus that the game grid is completely on the other side of the fourth wall without any in-universe presence) he certainly had oversight of the mission. As a result, while he does give lip service to having them move cautiously, he notably does *not* intervene to set them straight when they act like they do. That alone would be enough to hang him by the short and curlies in front of an inquest asking why the heck three out of four men sent in died.