After wanting to for a while, I finally purchased the original XCOM. Very fun game, great story, game play, and nice little touches all around. I will definitely be picking up number 2 pretty soon.
I'll have to add you to the Bf2s squad then. I suspect people will start dying soon.
[Blinking eyes thing]
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
Haha, I pledge my life to the cuase
Oh shit, we have our first Sectopod...
I've only heard it so far. I have a squad that consists of Cowami, Coke, Chuy, Newbie, Desert Fox, and Jay. That's not a bad team.
Will update how things go.
Edit: We are against:
- A Sectopod
- A Heavy Mec
- Three Shieldbearers
- A Viper
- An Archeon
- Two stunlancers
- Three Elite Troopers
- An Advent Commander
13 bad guys.
All at once. And Jay is currently beng strangled by the Viper. Things are going great...
Turn one:
- Cowami, with the most crucial task, sent her Gremlin to hack the Sectopod. 27% chance of a control. Had to go for it. Success!
- Coke, who doesn't trigger overwatch, ran to free Jay with his sword. Succeeded but only grazed the Viper. Jay finished it off.
- Used Desert Fox to trigger a couple of overwatches as he has the most armour. Shot at twice, one miss, three damage. Used a rocket to damage the Heavy Mech, and blow up two vehicles, further damaging the Mech and a Stun Lancer.
- Newbie used all her tricks. Lightning Hands missed but the first pistol shot damaged the mech further. Used Faceoff. Fired seven shots to inflict a number of injuries and destroy the Heavy Mech.
- Chuy relocated and broke his cover. Threw a Mimic Beacon.
Retaliation:
- Archeon fired off it's missiles and made a beeline for the beacon. Swiped and hit.
- First Elite Trooper ran up and finished off the beacon.
- Second Elite Trooper ran close. Threw a grenade at Coke and Jay. Did a lot of damage but killed himself in the resulting car explosion. Jay worst off, only one health left and on fire.
- Lancer moved to attack Coke. He was having none of it. Bladestorm and stunned the Lancer for two turns.
- Lancer moved to attack Cowami who dodged. She was then marked by the Elite Commander. One Shieldbearer moved to cover as did the third Trooper without doing anything else.
- Two other Shieldbearers threw their shields.
Six of Bf2s Squad are still alive.
Ten Advent are still alive. Eight in fighting condition.
Turn two:
- Cowami moves to new cover, uses Gremlin to extinguish and heal Jay who moves to new cover.
- Pausing to pick up loot, Coke R+Gs to new cover.
- Newbie moves to new cover. Throws a plasma grenade in the direction of the Advent Commander and his cover; a truck. Truck explodes, killing the Commander and removing Cowami's mark.
- Desert Fox launches a plasma grenade at Archeon, Trooper, and Lancer, killing the Trooper.
- Time to bring in the Sectopod. Kills non-stunned Lancer. Grazes Archeon. Prepares missile shot for one of the covered shieldbearers.
- Coke finishes off the Archeon.
- Chuy finishes off the stunned Lancer. Probably could have put him to better use.
- Jay mind controls a Shieldbearer.
Retaliation:
- One Shieldbearer moves to attack my mind slave. Does minor damage.
- Other Shieldbearer moves towards Sectopod and throws shield to protect him and Trooper.
- Trooper fires at Newbie. Misses. Newbie returns fire. Also misses.
Six of Bf2s Squad are still alive.
Five Advent are still alive. Three in fighting condition. The tide has turned.
Turn three:
- Sectopod and mind slave fire on one Shieldbearer. Do minimal damage. Jay moves up and finishes him off with a psychic attack.
- Newbie snipes Trooper.
- Chuy, Coke, and Desert Fox move up. Attack Sectopod in preparation for it's hack wearing off. Cowami moves and overwatches.
Retaliation:
- Remaning shildbearer climbs on roof of building. Attacks mind slave, doing significant damage. Cowami's overwatch misses.
Six of Bf2s Squad are still alive.
Three Advent are still alive. One in fighting condition. Time to end this.
Turn four:
- Mind slave moves up to roof to attack Shieldbearer. Misses.
- Desert Fox fires Acid Grenade to hit all three remaining Advent. Kills mind slave, damages Shieldbearer and Sectopod.
- Newbie snipes Sectopod, destroying it. Explosion removes Shieldbearer's cover and shield.
- Coke fires at Shieldbearer but misses, instead hitting the roof which is destroyed. Sheildbearer falls and is injured.
- Cowami fires. Finishes him off.
(The 14th Advent was an Archeon who was killed from initial overwatches when everything was triggered.)
Hooray!
Also please welcome Eagle and Ken Jennings to the squad. Eagle is a Greek Grenadier, Ken is an Australian Sharpshooter.
I've only heard it so far. I have a squad that consists of Cowami, Coke, Chuy, Newbie, Desert Fox, and Jay. That's not a bad team.
Will update how things go.
Edit: We are against:
- A Sectopod
- A Heavy Mec
- Three Shieldbearers
- A Viper
- An Archeon
- Two stunlancers
- Three Elite Troopers
- An Advent Commander
13 bad guys.
All at once. And Jay is currently beng strangled by the Viper. Things are going great...
Turn one:
- Cowami, with the most crucial task, sent her Gremlin to hack the Sectopod. 27% chance of a control. Had to go for it. Success!
- Coke, who doesn't trigger overwatch, ran to free Jay with his sword. Succeeded but only grazed the Viper. Jay finished it off.
- Used Desert Fox to trigger a couple of overwatches as he has the most armour. Shot at twice, one miss, three damage. Used a rocket to damage the Heavy Mech, and blow up two vehicles, further damaging the Mech and a Stun Lancer.
- Newbie used all her tricks. Lightning Hands missed but the first pistol shot damaged the mech further. Used Faceoff. Fired seven shots to inflict a number of injuries and destroy the Heavy Mech.
- Chuy relocated and broke his cover. Threw a Mimic Beacon.
Retaliation:
- Archeon fired off it's missiles and made a beeline for the beacon. Swiped and hit.
- First Elite Trooper ran up and finished off the beacon.
- Second Elite Trooper ran close. Threw a grenade at Coke and Jay. Did a lot of damage but killed himself in the resulting car explosion. Jay worst off, only one health left and on fire.
- Lancer moved to attack Coke. He was having none of it. Bladestorm and stunned the Lancer for two turns.
- Lancer moved to attack Cowami who dodged. She was then marked by the Elite Commander. One Shieldbearer moved to cover as did the third Trooper without doing anything else.
- Two other Shieldbearers threw their shields.
Six of Bf2s Squad are still alive.
Ten Advent are still alive. Eight in fighting condition.
Turn two:
- Cowami moves to new cover, uses Gremlin to extinguish and heal Jay who moves to new cover.
- Pausing to pick up loot, Coke R+Gs to new cover.
- Newbie moves to new cover. Throws a plasma grenade in the direction of the Advent Commander and his cover; a truck. Truck explodes, killing the Commander and removing Cowami's mark.
- Desert Fox launches a plasma grenade at Archeon, Trooper, and Lancer, killing the Trooper.
- Time to bring in the Sectopod. Kills non-stunned Lancer. Grazes Archeon. Prepares missile shot for one of the covered shieldbearers.
- Coke finishes off the Archeon.
- Chuy finishes off the stunned Lancer. Probably could have put him to better use.
- Jay mind controls a Shieldbearer.
Retaliation:
- One Shieldbearer moves to attack my mind slave. Does minor damage.
- Other Shieldbearer moves towards Sectopod and throws shield to protect him and Trooper.
- Trooper fires at Newbie. Misses. Newbie returns fire. Also misses.
Six of Bf2s Squad are still alive.
Five Advent are still alive. Three in fighting condition. The tide has turned.
Turn three:
- Sectopod and mind slave fire on one Shieldbearer. Do minimal damage. Jay moves up and finishes him off with a psychic attack.
- Newbie snipes Trooper.
- Chuy, Coke, and Desert Fox move up. Attack Sectopod in preparation for it's hack wearing off. Cowami moves and overwatches.
Retaliation:
- Remaning shildbearer climbs on roof of building. Attacks mind slave, doing significant damage. Cowami's overwatch misses.
Six of Bf2s Squad are still alive.
Three Advent are still alive. One in fighting condition. Time to end this.
Turn four:
- Mind slave moves up to roof to attack Shieldbearer. Misses.
- Desert Fox fires Acid Grenade to hit all three remaining Advent. Kills mind slave, damages Shieldbearer and Sectopod.
- Newbie snipes Sectopod, destroying it. Explosion removes Shieldbearer's cover and shield.
- Coke fires at Shieldbearer but misses, instead hitting the roof which is destroyed. Sheildbearer falls and is injured.
- Cowami fires. Finishes him off.
(The 14th Advent was an Archeon who was killed from initial overwatches when everything was triggered.)
Hooray!
Also please welcome Eagle and Ken Jennings to the squad. Eagle is a Greek Grenadier, Ken is an Australian Sharpshooter.
[Blinking eyes thing]
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
Played for and got.Ty wrote:
- Coke fires at Shieldbearer but misses, instead hitting the roof which is destroyed. Sheildbearer falls and is injured.
Well that was a disaster...
It should have been a routine extraction mission. It should have been simple. A first run for new named recruits Eagle and KJ. If only that were the case.
Initial contacts were all the heavies. Two squads assisted by an Andromedian and a Sectopod. It was tough but they were taken out with minimal injury. The target was approached. Protected by another squad and a Heavy Mech. Again the squad performed well, the target was acquired by KJ. Reinforcements called in but it looked like it would be easy.
Last contact. Enemy in a difficult dug-in position. Coke moves into attack a Shieldbearer with a rapid fire attack. 72% change of hits. Only wounds target. Newbie attempts to finish it off. Misses and ignites Coke's cover. Shieldbearer escapes, scores flanked hit on Coke. Vehicle explodes.
RIP
Edit: My mistake, SJ Warden was my Sharpshooter on that mission. Newbie is innocent.
It should have been a routine extraction mission. It should have been simple. A first run for new named recruits Eagle and KJ. If only that were the case.
Initial contacts were all the heavies. Two squads assisted by an Andromedian and a Sectopod. It was tough but they were taken out with minimal injury. The target was approached. Protected by another squad and a Heavy Mech. Again the squad performed well, the target was acquired by KJ. Reinforcements called in but it looked like it would be easy.
Last contact. Enemy in a difficult dug-in position. Coke moves into attack a Shieldbearer with a rapid fire attack. 72% change of hits. Only wounds target. Newbie attempts to finish it off. Misses and ignites Coke's cover. Shieldbearer escapes, scores flanked hit on Coke. Vehicle explodes.
RIP
Edit: My mistake, SJ Warden was my Sharpshooter on that mission. Newbie is innocent.
[Blinking eyes thing]
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
So basically Macbeth fucked up and killed me, bloody typical.
I'm liking how Newbie is a bit of a badass. I can get behind that.
If you need more Canin fodder, feel free to add me in.
As luck would have it I've picked up two new Colonels. Canin, you're a Norweigian Specialist.
The other is an Irish Ranger chick. Please welcome Dilbert.
Good timing too, I've let the Avatar Project get a bit too far ahead and have to launch an attack against a facility. A lot of soldiers are out injured so it's time to bring in the new meat.
The other is an Irish Ranger chick. Please welcome Dilbert.
Good timing too, I've let the Avatar Project get a bit too far ahead and have to launch an attack against a facility. A lot of soldiers are out injured so it's time to bring in the new meat.
[Blinking eyes thing]
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
The new patch finally cleans up the performance and fixes some bugs:
Performance
Added Zip Mode gameplay option. While Zip Mode is enabled animation (like step outs & gremlin movements) speeds are significantly increased. Normal movement animations are moderately increased.
Fixed an issue where shadow rendering during glam cam shot transitions was slowing down performance.
Support for Nvidia SLI and AMD Crossfire
Removed MSAA options from default presets and adjusted autodetect to target 40 fps instead of 30 fps.
Reworked Light Clipping Manager
Particle Vertex Buffer Reallocation
Optimization to shadows in the Avenger
Enable triple buffering to fix VSync performance.
Shadowed light fade out within Avenger; Disabled Post & Pre-Mission cinematic lights not being used.
Disabled shadow casting from character lights within the Avenger.
Reduced High Shadow Resolution - Reduce shadow resolution when set to HIGH to 1536, instead of 2048.
Reduces the impact count of the Avatar Rifle
Removed a hitch that occurs when the camera enables/disables building visualizer.
Deferred profile saves to next tick. This prevents multiple calls within the same frame from creating multiple requests to save the profile.
After changing graphics settings, based on the selected preset, extra crew will be capped.
Character head mesh optimized.
Balance
Mimic beacon rebalance: Price increased to 75.
Mimic beacons can no longer take cover, and are guaranteed to be hit by enemy shots.
Wet Work is no longer retroactive.
Graze is no longer a chance for 100% shots. Targets being shot by a concealed attacker cannot dodge.
Gameplay
Added a new recommended Steam Controller configuration with support for additional actions.
Fixed an issue where VIP units would take damage when their origin location was damaged.
Fixed an issue where Promotion Earned text appeared before action is seen on screen.
Fixed an issue where civilians pathed to the base of ladders and blocked XCOM units.
Fixed an issue where Character Pool choices like Class, Attitude, and props did not save.
Fixed an issue where weapons did not keep names and customizations upon tier bump.
Fixed an issue causing some scan timers to go into negative time.
Engineering items that are full squad upgrades are now designated in the UI.
Fixed an issue where strategy project timers reset if players started building a radio relay immediately after making contact with a region.
Fixed an issue with POIs not spawning when first visiting the Geoscape if Beginner VO is turned off.
Removed start-of-turn hang during certain missions where enemy units had fallen out of the world. Auto-saves (and ironman saves) made in these situations should now be playable.
Minimized action camera obstructions.
Minimized camera look-at hopping during AI abilities.
Fixed an issue where Psi abilities did not trigger death cams.
Kill Zone now respects concealment status.
Fixed an issue where the Ever Vigilant AWC perk did not work for Sharpshooters.
Buildings don't cut down when tabbing through units.
Fixed an exploit that skips the AI turn by spamming the END/BACKSPACE button while the Player's last action is being visualized.
Rapid Fire and Chain Shot visualization optimized to get the second shot to fire faster.
Fixed an issue where shot HUD wings would fail to re-open after taking an action that required the wings to close.
Fixed an issue where crit chance would be negatively affected by shots with a success chance greater than 100.
Optimized Return Fire hits causing long delays.
Optimized AI reveals causing long hangs.
Optimized Wait actions causing long timeouts.
Optimized falling unit visualization to timeout faster.
Updated the Geoscape save description to use the localized HQ time, instead of previously used GMT game time.
Fixed an issue with an invalid spawn point on a specific Retaliation mission plot.
Destroyed cover does not take reduce % to-hit on enemies.
Systems
New option to only use Character Pool creations until the pool is exhausted.
Bulletproofing bad saves from causing main menu crashes.
Fixed an issue causing hitches in strategy.
Fixed an issue where armor customizations did not save.
Graphics
Unit Highlighting Flash when targeting units.
Multiplayer
Fixes slow communications with internet players resulting in delays between actions, turns, and end-of-game screen.
Added camera rotation to multiplayer.
So I took a break but the adventures of Bf2s Squad continues.
Honestly I may have to look at upping the difficulty again. This squad has things under control.
Here's the scenario: The Avennger gets shot down by an enemy UFO and dropped a device that prevented us taking off again. I sent out a squad to destroy it and defend the site. Here's, (L to R,) Jay, Newbie, Cowami, and Desert Fox.
Plan was to put Ty in stealth mode and get eyes on the device for Newbie and Warden to snipe at. Solid plan. Killed a few outliers as Ty got closer, got eyes on and the snipers fired a two shots at the device, only one hitting. Triggered the mass of enemies guarding the thing and got Ty spotted. However Central had sent out Chuy who I had sent up the right flank for if Ty got spotted. So I pulled Ty back and ensured Chuy, in stealth mode, moved to maintain eyes on.
I moved up Jay to see if I could take over a Gatekeeper. She was successful. What I could do from there was essentially pick off everyone else at my leisure. If the enemy got a shot off it was generally at the Gatekeeper which was sturdy enough to cop it. As the two snipers destroyed the device the aliens were getting utterly shredded. The worst thing to happen was a bit of damage to some turrets and Eagle being mind controlled but the Sectoid that did it was swiftly taken care of before any damage was done.
As I destroyed the device and pulled back the troops the Aliens sent constant reinforcements. They were destroyed mostly by the snipers and Desert Fox with the rest picking off whoever managed to survive the initial onslaught. At one point Warden killed four Advent and one Heavy Mech in one move, the only thing that stopped her was running out of ammo. These guys to be exact. You can see the carnage.
From there it was just moving and ensuring each new wave was destroyed. As everyone returned the the Avenger I found myself out of targets. Oh the aliens were sending another wave of reinforcements but they were a way out and I wasn't fussed waiting for them. I instructed Newbie to destroy the mind controlled Gatekeeper and we got out of there.
Owned. (That one "killed" is the Gatekeeper. He doesn't count.)
Bf2s Squad is invincible.
Honestly I may have to look at upping the difficulty again. This squad has things under control.
Here's the scenario: The Avennger gets shot down by an enemy UFO and dropped a device that prevented us taking off again. I sent out a squad to destroy it and defend the site. Here's, (L to R,) Jay, Newbie, Cowami, and Desert Fox.
Plan was to put Ty in stealth mode and get eyes on the device for Newbie and Warden to snipe at. Solid plan. Killed a few outliers as Ty got closer, got eyes on and the snipers fired a two shots at the device, only one hitting. Triggered the mass of enemies guarding the thing and got Ty spotted. However Central had sent out Chuy who I had sent up the right flank for if Ty got spotted. So I pulled Ty back and ensured Chuy, in stealth mode, moved to maintain eyes on.
I moved up Jay to see if I could take over a Gatekeeper. She was successful. What I could do from there was essentially pick off everyone else at my leisure. If the enemy got a shot off it was generally at the Gatekeeper which was sturdy enough to cop it. As the two snipers destroyed the device the aliens were getting utterly shredded. The worst thing to happen was a bit of damage to some turrets and Eagle being mind controlled but the Sectoid that did it was swiftly taken care of before any damage was done.
As I destroyed the device and pulled back the troops the Aliens sent constant reinforcements. They were destroyed mostly by the snipers and Desert Fox with the rest picking off whoever managed to survive the initial onslaught. At one point Warden killed four Advent and one Heavy Mech in one move, the only thing that stopped her was running out of ammo. These guys to be exact. You can see the carnage.
From there it was just moving and ensuring each new wave was destroyed. As everyone returned the the Avenger I found myself out of targets. Oh the aliens were sending another wave of reinforcements but they were a way out and I wasn't fussed waiting for them. I instructed Newbie to destroy the mind controlled Gatekeeper and we got out of there.
Owned. (That one "killed" is the Gatekeeper. He doesn't count.)
Bf2s Squad is invincible.
[Blinking eyes thing]
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
Commanding a bunch of racist insurgents in any game that wasn't about fighting actual aliens would cause so much controversy …
Doi. Remember the controversy that erupted out of that Medal of Honour game that let people play as the Taliban?
[Blinking eyes thing]
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
Oh yeah, but only video gamers remember MoH nowadays.
So ends the tale of Bf2s Squad. And to be perfectly honest, they had it way too easy.
First task was to destroy an alien communications site. I could only send a covert team in so I picked Desert Fox, Cowami, SJW, and Chuy. I've never had a mission go more smoothly, it wasn't even a contest. Cowami was assassinating enemies left and right while Chuy and Desert Fox could lay on major pain, (both had double-tap moves despite Fox being a Grenadier,) and SJW mopped up by stringing together 100% sniper shots. Flawless mission.
Final mission was to attack the main stronghold. Picked Ty, Desert Fox, Jay, Cowami, SJW, and Newbie, (who was injured but I needed her multiple pistol shots.) Easy enough approach but the final battle proved problematic when enemies turned up everywhere and people kept getting mind controlled. Was a memorable moment when SJW went through two superior magazines of sniper ammo, (free reload,) to mop up seven or eight enemies, including an Avatar.
Things were getting dicey and Desert Fox has to be revived after taking on two Avatars, two Bezerkers and two Mutons but eventually the last Avatar fell to Ty's sword because I am a shameless glory-hog.
I'm going to have to do this again on the highest difficulty.
Overall MVP Award: Desert Fox.
Having a Grenadier who randomly learned double-tap was just overpowered. Add two grenades and a shredstorm cannon, (and the "Salvo" skill that allowed a subsequent attack if you started with one of them,) and you had a soldier that could do three high-damage attacks in a turn, shred through armour, and apply holo-targeting.
That's XCOM Baby Award: Newbie
How do you miss this? How? The pistol is inside his helmet!
Cadaverific Award: Coke
For being the only soldier who died. In a comically useless way sadly.
First task was to destroy an alien communications site. I could only send a covert team in so I picked Desert Fox, Cowami, SJW, and Chuy. I've never had a mission go more smoothly, it wasn't even a contest. Cowami was assassinating enemies left and right while Chuy and Desert Fox could lay on major pain, (both had double-tap moves despite Fox being a Grenadier,) and SJW mopped up by stringing together 100% sniper shots. Flawless mission.
Final mission was to attack the main stronghold. Picked Ty, Desert Fox, Jay, Cowami, SJW, and Newbie, (who was injured but I needed her multiple pistol shots.) Easy enough approach but the final battle proved problematic when enemies turned up everywhere and people kept getting mind controlled. Was a memorable moment when SJW went through two superior magazines of sniper ammo, (free reload,) to mop up seven or eight enemies, including an Avatar.
Things were getting dicey and Desert Fox has to be revived after taking on two Avatars, two Bezerkers and two Mutons but eventually the last Avatar fell to Ty's sword because I am a shameless glory-hog.
I'm going to have to do this again on the highest difficulty.
Overall MVP Award: Desert Fox.
Having a Grenadier who randomly learned double-tap was just overpowered. Add two grenades and a shredstorm cannon, (and the "Salvo" skill that allowed a subsequent attack if you started with one of them,) and you had a soldier that could do three high-damage attacks in a turn, shred through armour, and apply holo-targeting.
That's XCOM Baby Award: Newbie
How do you miss this? How? The pistol is inside his helmet!
Cadaverific Award: Coke
For being the only soldier who died. In a comically useless way sadly.
[Blinking eyes thing]
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
Steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/tzyon
YAY I win..
Finally got down to sitting down and finishing my first playthrough with a clutch final mission. I didn't realize that there's currently no Second Wave options (at least, without consulting mods) which did make me less enthused to do a second run, though I do need to do one to explore all the new DLCs that have since been released.
since he was forced out at konami, a certain someone took up killing aliens
Four years passed. Four hundred hours passed and I am still enjoying the hell from this game. Do you guys play or have you already finished ironman? I play legendary - yes but ironman? Too much of a chicken. I really get attached to my guys and it is such a blow when someone dies.
I think I played XCOM on normal difficulty because I was annoyed at being able to have the personnel and resources but not able to expand the transport fleet so I could respond to the growing number of events. Felt like just a more complicated, immersion-breaking way of having a time limit.
This is the same problem I had. I wanted to maximize what I got out of it by getting as much research and construction done as possible, but the game starts to slowly overwhelm you with too many different things to respond to and no way to possibly respond to it all, which eventually leads to a game over. It makes it difficult to get a feel for what the game considers to be an acceptable amount of pacing vs making overall progress. XCOM 2 improves on this because it at least has a doomsday counter that basically tells you how close you are to something bad happening unless you complete something significant in the story that lowers or resets it.unnamednewbie13 wrote:
I think I played XCOM on normal difficulty because I was annoyed at being able to have the personnel and resources but not able to expand the transport fleet so I could respond to the growing number of events. Felt like just a more complicated, immersion-breaking way of having a time limit.
XCOM: Enemy Unknown also had a panic mechanism where the Council would yell at you before things got too dire. I think the mid-game is always gonna feel like you're behind the curve because you don't yet have the staff to quickly complete research and multiple projects seem important. XCOM 2 is nice in that with the Avatar project progress, oftentimes it advances when they build things at the Alien Facilities, so when you do the missions to destroy them, you can drop 2-4 blocks easily. I never felt comfortable until the end game where you have panic-reducing methods and workshops/lab are often idle because you have no more projects.