1.0 beta 3

Welcome to a new version of Long War of the Chosen!

While beta 1 was supposed to mark the stage of "feature complete", that wasn't really the case, as you'll discover with the huge number of changes in beta 3! Because of that, we highly recommend you start a new campaign when you upgrade to beta 3 from beta 2.

Here are some of the headline changes you may be interested in:

• Chosen now activate at force level 5, increase in strength (more HP and armour) at fixed, later force levels, and have more impact on the strategy layer with Sabotage and Retribution
• All the faction soldiers have had some significant work done on their abilities
• Covert actions can now fail, with the rank of the soldiers on the action influencing the failure chance (higher ranks == greater failure chance reduction); not all covert actions can fail, though
• You will now encounter sit reps, both positive and negative, on some of the missions
• Alien Rulers now appear via sit reps (gated by force level) rather than according to some obscure rules
• Temporary dark events that affect tactical battles directly, for example Undying Loyalty and Rapid Response, no longer apply to all missions while active; instead, they increase the chance that you will encounter the corresponding sit rep on a mission
• Resistance orders are disabled by default, but can be enabled via a second wave option
• Will loss and recovery has changed significantly, for example, Will no longer recovers during infiltration

|| Download the release from here ||

More details on all the balance changes and bug fixes below.

WARNING If you choose not to upgrade to 1.0 beta 3 yet, be aware that a new version of Dedicated Pistol Slot mod will cause issues with pistol slots in existing campaigns. See this Reddit post for details and a solution.

Mod dependency changes Dedicated Pistol Slot and Revival Protocol Fixes are now integrated into LWOTC and incompatible with it. You will need to unsubcribe from them or disable them.

IMPORTANT If you're upgrading from beta 2 or a development build and want to continue an existing campaign, make sure you load a strategy save after the upgrade, i.e. one that was created while you were on the Avenger. Also, use the new RespecSelectedSoldier console command on your faction soldiers to get the new ability trees.

Read the installation instructions for information on how to perform the upgrade.

Please feel free to join us on our Discord server, submit feedback via issues in GitHub, or start a thread on the Pavonis Interactive forums.

Changelog

Here are the changes since beta 2:

Mods

• Dedicated Pistol Slot is no longer required and must be disabled or removed
• Revival Protocol Fixes is no longer required and must be disabled or removed
• LW2: Better Squad Icon Selector has been integrated into LWOTC
• Using LWOTC and RPGO together should no longer result in a massive drop in FPS

Class and ability changes

Reapers

• Distraction now disorients enemies caught in the Claymore explosion rather
  than putting the Reaper into Shadow. Replaces Walk Fire at LCPL rank.

• Lone Wolf replaces Precision Shot at LCPL.

• Tracking is a new ability that allows Reapers to detect units within
  slightly more than visual range, even if they are out of line of
  sight. Replaces Target Definition at CPL.

• Sting swaps with Silent Killer and Dead Eye replaces Distraction at SGT.

• Highlands replaces Covert at SSGT, with Covert moving to TSGT.

• Covert replaces Death Dealer, Homing Mine replaces Highlands, and
  Precision Shot replaces Lone Wolf at TSGT.

• Disabling Shot is a new ability that stuns most units in the game
  for 2 actions (it won't work on units immune to stun), or for 4
  actions if it crits. Does half normal damage and can't do crit damage.
  Replaces Dead Eye at GSGT.

• Hit and Run replaces Homing Mine at GSGT.

• Shadow Rising (one extra Shadow charge) and Serial replace Ghost
  Grenade and Implacable at MSGT. Ghost Grenade is now an XCOM
  ability.

• Squad Sight is now a tier 2 XCOM ability for Reapers instead of tier 1.

• Reapers now get a normal selection of XCOM abilities like other
  soldier classes.

• Throwing the evac flare now breaks the Reaper's Shadow concealment
  (if the Reaper throws it of course).

Skirmishers

• Reflex can proc once per turn now, but not more than once.

• Justice and Wrath now have a 4-turn cooldown (down from 5).

• Justice should no longer destroy everything (rocks, walls, etc.).

• Judgement has a greater base chance to cause panic and the higher
  the Skirmisher's Will, the greater the addtional chance for it to proc.

• Full Throttle's mobility buff is now 3 (up from 2) and lasts for 2
  turns (including the turn it activates). Still stacks.

• Whiplash behaves more like Justice and Wrath now, with scaling
  damage based on Ripjack tier, a 1-action-point cost, and a bonus
  to aim. It still does bonus damage to robotic enemies.

• Battlelord now has a 5-turn cooldown in place of charges. It can also
  proc an unlimited number of times on the turn it's active. Hit and Run,
  Death from Above, Close Encounters and Full Throttle can not proc while
  Battlelord or Skirmisher Interrupt are active.

• Reckoning is back as a MSGT ability (it provides Fleche and Slash abilities
  that use the Ripjack).

• Manual Override is now targetable and resets all the target's cooldowns.
  Cannot currently be used on self.

Templars

• Templars no longer have a guaranteed hit on Rend. This means your
  Templars can now graze as well as miss. The gauntlets give +25 aim
  to compensate.

• You can now equip Templars with caster gauntlets (conventional, ionic
  and fusion versions) instead of the original shard gauntlets.

• The caster gauntlets give the Templar 1 focus at the start of the
  mission and provide the Channel ability (killed units have a chance
  to drop collectable focus).

• Both shard and caster gauntlets grant Deep Focus at ionic (Arc Blade)
  tier and Supreme Focus at fusion tier.

• The shard gauntlets add a Fleche damage bonus to Rend, although slightly
  less generous than for Shinobis' sword attack.

• Focus does not provide bonus mobility any more, and it only increases
  dodge by +3 for each point of focus, and damage by +1 at focus levels
  of 1 and 3 (focus levels of 2 and 4 do not add any extra damage
  beyond 1 and 3).

• Overcharge has been reworked to simply provide bonus aim and defense
  based on the current focus level.

• Templars now have access to a LCPL Vigilance ability that grants 1 focus
  when an enemy pod is activated, i.e. they scamper.

• Volt uses area suppression targeting, so the number of units you can
  hit no longer depends on the Templar's focus level. The radius is 1 less
  than for Gunner's Area Suppression.

• Blademaster replaces Channel at CPL.

• There is a new SGT High Voltage ability that increases the radius of Volt
  by 2 tiles.

• Pillar can be used in place of a Momentum action. It can still be
  used as a normal action as well.

• Stun Strike now stuns instead of disorienting enemies.

• Templars now have access to a Solace ability for clearing mental
  conditions on their allies. It's a targetable ability rather than an
  aura.

• Terrorize is a new ability at TSGT that adds a chance to panic to
  Volt.

• Void Conduit should disable for the correct number of actions (a bug meant
  that it wasn't disabling at all if the Templar had 2 focus or less).

• Apotheosis is a new MSGT ability that consumes all focus and grants the
  Templar +100 Dodge, double Rend damage, and +2 Mobility per focus consumed
  above 2, i.e. +2 for 3 focus, +4 for 4 focus. Requires a minimum of 3 focus
  to activate.

• Templars now get a normal selection of XCOM abilities like other
  soldier classes.

Miscellaneous

• XCOM soldiers start with lower Will than before, with a much lower range
  of Will values. Will values are now closer to what they were in original
  Long War 2.

• Faction soldier stat progression, particularly HP, has been toned down a
  bit, so they won't be quite so tanky at MSGT.

• Fleche bonus damage is capped at +5, so moving more than 20 tiles with a
  Shinobi Fleche does not provide any extra damage beyond that.

• Fleche no longer applies its bonus damage to other damage effects like
  Shredder or the Burning effect of Fusion Blade.

• The Fleche bonus damage can now graze (so no more 7+ damage grazes with a
  conventional sword).

• Full Override's first ability is now Greater Shutdown, which simply shuts
  a robotic enemy down for 3 turns.

• Full Override's Master Enemy now has a special variant for Sectopods with
  a much-reduced success chance, which means you have to be quite lucky to
  pull off this mission-winning tactic.

• MECs mastered via Full Override will now become Resistance MECs even if you
  evac them from a mission.

• Bombardier (+2 to grenade range) now works for Reaper Claymores as well.

• Close and Personal is now a tier 2 XCOM ability for Shinobis rather than tier 1.

• Various AP cost issues have been fixed, for example where Squad Sight as an
  XCOM perk was costing 25 AP rather than 20.

Tactical combat changes

Chosen

• Shell shock damage bonus reduced to 34%.
• Brittle Damage bonus reduced to 15%.
• Bewildered Damage bonus reduced to 25%....

1.0 beta 2

Welcome to a new version of Long War of the Chosen!

Here are some of the headline changes you may be interested in:

• Regular soldiers now have a pistol slot and the pistol abilities work (conventional pistols won't be available in existing campaigns, only new ones, but you will be able to equip pistols that you build)
• The old LW2 Smash and Grab mission is back, so you will now get a mix of that and the Supply Extraction mission
• Headshot on The Lost is now disabled by default on Commander and Legend difficulties (configurable in INI)
• You can enable a campaign Advanced Option so that you can purchase multiple class abilities at the same rank (this is blocked by default to prevent XCOM power creep)
• Reapers, Skirmishers and SPARKs now have laser and coilgun variants of their primary weapons (we would really appreciate new models and skins for these!)
• You will now face the correct Chosen on the Stronghold assault

Download the release from here

EDIT If you're upgrading mid-campaign, add this line to the mod's XComLW_Overhaul.ini config file after the other +UnlimitedItemsAdded entries - this will allow you to equip conventional pistols:

+UnlimitedItemsAdded="Pistol_CV"

More details on all the balance changes and bug fixes below.

IMPORTANT If you're upgrading from beta 1 or a development build and want to continue an existing campaign, make sure you load a strategy save after the upgrade, i.e. one that was created while you were on the Avenger.

Read the installation instructions for information on how to perform the upgrade.

Most balancing feedback comes from Legend players right now, so we would greatly appreciate feedback from Rookie, Veteran and Commander players. You can join us on our Discord server, submit feedback via issues in GitHub, or start a thread on the Pavonis Interactive forums.

Changelog

Here are the changes since beta 1:

Mods

• Revival Protocol Fixes is now a required mod
• Dedicated Pistol Slot is now a required mod
• Reliable Smoke is recommended to get LW2-like behavior for smoke grenades
• Show More Buff Details is recommended so you can see status durations, like how long a hack or mind control will last

Class and ability changes

• Reapers, Skirmishers and SPARKs now have laser and coilgun variants of their weapons, although new models and skins that match the aesthetic of the tiers would be welcome contributions!
• Purchasing a class ability at the same rank as you have already picked one will incur a cost penalty: the first such ability will cost 1.5x normal, the next one will cost double, the next 2.5x and so on (this penalty is tracked per soldier) - this only affects faction soldiers unless you have enabled the Advanced Option to allow purchasing extra class abilities for regular soldiers
• The random XCOM abilities have been changed so each soldier gets 4 tier 1 abilities, 2 tier 2, and 1 tier 3, at costs of 10AP, 20AP and 40AP respectively - this is to provide soldier variety without making them overpowered
• Pistol abilities will now work if a soldier has a pistol equipped in the dedicated pistol slot
• Removed Light 'em Up from Sharpshooter XCOM branch (allowed Sharpshooter to shoot twice in one turn with no cooldown)
• Rapid Fire now has a 1-turn cooldown, i.e. it will be unavailable for just one turn after the turn it's used
• Chain Lightning has a -50 penalty to aim
• Resilience crit defense reduced from 50 to 30 - since the Sectopod now has it, didn't want to make it that hard to crit the thing

Tactical combat changes

• On Commander and Legend, Headshot no longer works on The Lost, making them more of a tactical challenge (you can change this setting for all difficulties via the HEADSHOT_ENABLED property in XComLW_Overhaul.ini)
• The Lost's turn now occurs between XCOM and the aliens - this stops The Lost from wasting all the enemy's overwatch shots
• The Lost now target both XCOM and the aliens 50% of the time each (basically Fair Lost Targeting)
• Purifiers and the Chosen now have more HP and armor
• Purifiers have a higher chance to hit (but the flamethrower is still blocked by full cover)
• Teamwork now requires line of sight to work (just like the officer ability Command)
• Level 1 Teamwork only grants a movement action; you get a standard action with Level 2 (Advanced) Teamwork
• Enemies on yellow or red alert have an increased detection radius (a small increase for yellow, a larger one for red) - this makes it harder to keep a non-stealth-focused Shinobi concealed for a whole mission, encouraging their use as fighters; also nerfs spotters for snipers
• Reinforcements should now drop more randomly, rather than often dropping in the same spot every turn
• All unique sources of hack defense reduction (Redscreen Rounds, Bluescreen Bombs, Arc Pulser etc.) now stack with one another, but they cannot stack with themselves, i.e. multiple hits with Redscreen Rounds won't reduce the hack defense more than a single hit
• Redscreen Rounds reduce hack defense by 30, up from 25 - this makes up for the fact they no longer stack with themselves
• The death of the Templar Ghost no longer triggers Vengeance if it's active
• Mutons have a cooldown for their bayonet attacks, so Combatives will only lock them down for one turn before they shoot
• Auto Loaders and Expanded Magazines can no longer be used on the same weapon (the combination gives certain high damage builds a significant power boost)
• Scopes give +4/+7/+10 Aim, Hair Triggers give +4/+7/+10 Aim (after reaction fire penalty)
• Stocks provide a 20/25/30% chance of Grazing Fire (extra roll to turn a miss into a graze)
• Steady Weapon has been moved from stocks to sniper rifles and the bonus crit chance has been removed
• Fusion sword burn chance reduced to 10%, Arc Blade stun chance reduced to 5% - reduces the surprisingly high lockdown chance when combined with Combatives and Bladestorm
• Sectopods now have Resilience (-30% crit chance for soldier targeting it) - makes the unit less susceptible to Kubiriki shots
• Extended Information's shot HUD will now be used automatically if that mod is installed

Missions

• The Lost will no longer appear on missions before Force Level 3, since Rookies have a hard time dealing with them - this also means they won't show up on Gatecrasher
• The old LW2 Smash and Grab (with a revealed start) can now spawn instead of the Supply Extraction mission (basically a 50-50 chance of getting one or the other)
• Supply Extraction mission rewards significantly less alloys and elerium now, bringing it close to the old Smash and Grab rewards - the mission was leaving players swimming in alloys and elerium by mid game, making it very easy to build plenty of coilguns
• The disabled-UFO mission will no longer grant corpses or end automatically once all enemy units are dead if the beacon wasn't disabled in time - this also fixes a bug where the mission wouldn't end if you didn't disable the beacon in time
• Chosen Stronghold now requires 100% infiltration, just like the Golden Path missions
• The final room in the Chosen Stronghold now has more enemies at the start, and more spawn than before when the Chosen is "killed"

Campaign/Geoscape Changes

• Liberation 1 missions are now labeled "Start Liberating Region" to help newcomers understand it's an important mission and what it's for
• It is no longer possible to enable the Lost and Abandoned mission or the Precision Explosives Advanced (Second Wave) Option - the former caused campaigns to bug out and the latter does nothing because LWOTC adds damage falloff to all grenades anyway
• You can now activate an "Allow Same Rank Abilities" Advanced Option at the beginning of the campaign or during one so that you can purchase class abilities with AP on regular soldiers (once the Training Center has been built), not just faction soldiers
• The covert actions for tracking down the Chosen require higher-rank soldiers than before, slowing down access to more resistance order slots and the stronghold mission
• The Find Faction covert actions now require SGT and SSGT soldiers - this is to slow down the acquisition of the other faction soldiers, making the starting faction more impactful
• The Find Faction covert actions now reward soldiers at CPL and SGT (for nearest and furthest factions respectively)
• Reaper HQ now generates significantly less Intel than it did before (1-4 every two days)
• Templar HQ only improves healing rate by 25% now instead of 50%
• Corpse rendering, Basic Research, Engineering Research, ADVENT datapad decryption and Alien Data Cache decryption can no longer be inspired (so you should get more useful inspirations now)
• Faction soldiers can now go on Combat Intelligence covert actions
• The Counter Attack dark event has been disabled because it was interacting badly with the yellow alert reflex actions (the ones taken after a pod scampers)
• Troopers no longer get Lightning Reflexes from the tactical (i.e. permanent) dark event of the same name (for now...) - WOTC introduced a new dark event with exactly the same name as an existing LW2 one, which was causing a conflict
• The Information War resistance order now requires the second level of faction influence - it pretty much guaranteed control of drones in the early game
• Volunteer Army resistance order has bee...

1.0 beta 1

Welcome to a new version of Long War of the Chosen!

This is the first beta version and marks effectively "feature completedness". And as part of that, we're using the new name Long War of the Chosen publicly to help distinguish it from original Long War 2. It's been called LWOTC informally for a while, so this just makes it official.

Apologies for this not being on Steam Workshop. We were hoping to put the beta on there, but it just hasn't worked out. We will try to get it ready for the next release.

The major change for this release is a significant rebalancing of the faction soldiers. Every one of them now has a Master Sergeant rank and they have more abilities to flesh out their perk trees. Much more work will need to be done to balance these powerful soldiers, but hopefully you will enjoy the new abilities in the meantime. Except for Reapers. They got nerfed hard.

For installation instructions, look at the starter guide in the zip file or follow the instructions on the wiki.

Upgrade notes If you're upgrading from alpha 5 or newer, please follow these steps:

• Make sure you save your current campaign while you're on the Avenger!
• Replace the existing mods with the new ones.
• Subscribe to the newly required mods:
  • WotC: robojumper's Squad Select
  • Better Second Wave Mod Support
  • [WOTC] Revert Overwatch Rules Change
• Remove the old LongWarOfTheChosen and X2WOTCCommunityHighlander mod directories and replace them with the new ones.
• After starting the game, load from your strategy save.
• If you had the Chosen enabled be sure to open up the Change Difficulty menu on the Avenger, select Advanced Options and then make sure the Enable Chosen second wave option is checked. Once you've done that, save your game again.
• If you want to get the latest perk trees for the faction soldiers, subscribe to the Additional Soldier Console Commands mod and use the RebuildSelectedSoldierClasses console command — without any arguments! — when you have the soldier you want to respec open in any of the Armory screens.
• If you want to remove Increase Income and Breakthrough Tech Covert Actions (which have now been disabled), use the RefreshCovertActions console command.

This is a significant release, with plenty of folks to thank. See Acknowledgements at the end to learn who's been contributing. And feel free to join us on our Discord server!

Changelog

Here are the changes since alpha 6:

Reaper

Overall, Reaper's stealth has been nerfed, but they are still the stealthiest unit in the game, especially if they get Covert, and they're the only one that can damage and kill units without losing concealment. They just can't single-handedly win missions any more.

• Now has a Master Sergeant rank
• Detection radius has increased to be in line with Shinobis, but they get Ghostwalker for free at Squaddie level.
• Precision Shot and Walk Fire have been addeded a LCPL.
• Remote Start has been moved to CPL and now only has a single charge rather than a cooldown.
• Needle has been moved to down CPL from SGT.
• Shrapnel has been moved up to SGT from CPL.
• Covert has been added at SSGT.
• Lone Wolf has been added at TSGT.
• Banish has been moved up to GSGT from Tech Sergeant.
• Dead Eye has been added at GSGT.
• Annihilate had been added at MSGT, while Ghost Grenade and Implacable have been added at this rank.

Skirmisher

Skirmishers are in a state of flux right now, so expect more changes here. The current rebalance focuses on making them true "skirmishing" units that stick to the fringes of battle and make a nuisance of themselves. Note that Forward Operator was removed because it was simply broken, allowing Skirmishers to basically complete some missions solo without any risk. It may return in a modified form in a later version.

• Now has a Master Sergeant rank.
• Starts with Hit and Run instead of Marauder to encourage more mobility in battle. Also gets a grenade slot for utility, has a small infiltration bonus, and gets the Damn Good Ground bonus.
• Justice and Wrath cooldowns are now 4 turns, and Whiplash has a 4-turn cooldown as well instead of having a single charge.
• Interrupt is now a free action with a 3-turn cooldown and is an XCOM ability (like an AWC ability)
• The GTS Parkour research decreases the Grapple cooldown to 2 from 3.
• Total Combat is now an XCOM ability and replaced by Combat Awareness at LCPL.
• Retribution has been moved to LCPL from SSGT
• Low Profile and Body Shield have been added at CPL, while Zero In has been moved to the XCOM abilities.
• Smart Macrophages and Combat Fitness have been added at SGT.
• Full Throttle has been moved up to SSGT from SGT, where Shredder and Formidable have been added.
• Combat Presence has been moved to the XCOM abilities.
• Judgement has been moved from GSGT to TSGT, where Run and Gun and Aggression have been added.
• Waylay has been removed as a Skirmisher skill entirely as has Reckoning (for now).
• Implacable and BringEmOn have been added at GSGT.
• Battlelord has been moved to MSGT where it is joined by Lethal and Tactical Sense

Templar

Templars don't have many changes in the skill slots, but some skills themselves have been reworked.

• Now has a Master Sergeant rank.
• Pillar is now a free action that can be used after Rend (like Parry)
• Stun strike no longer disorients, but will stun and knock back the enemy; hit chance increased from 65% to 75%; stuns for 1 turn.
• Deflect has a 25%/30%/35%/40% chance to block a shot with 1/2/3/4 focus.
• Reflect has a chance to reflect the shot back at the shooter on a successful Deflection; the chance to turn a Deflect into a Reflect is 80%/85%/90% at 2/3/4 focus.
• Reflect can also trigger on a Parry at a 30%/40%/50% chance at 2/3/4 focus.
• Reaper has been added at GSGT.
• Bladestorm and Supreme Focus (requires Deep Focus, increases max focus to 4) have been added at MSGT.

Mission Changes

• The Chosen base assault is now a 5-soldier mission.
• The Avenger Defense mission works with faction soldiers now, so they're counted properly and can evac the mission.
• Turrets from the Defense Matrix will now appear on the Avenger Defense mission.
• XCOM reinforcements on the Avenger Defense now have action points, so you can actually use them!
• The Invasion mission doesn't ramp up reinforcements as fast as it did before, but you can no longer cheese the mission by shooting the spike for 10 damage or more in one shot. It's harder to shoot the spike with Sharpshooters too now, as some of the locations with clear lines of sight around them have been moved.
• Faction soldiers can now pick up the Black Site vial.
• All-alien pods should have greater diversity in their unit composition now.
• Alien Rulers now behave as they do in WOTC, which means that stuns, frozen, etc. only last per Ruler Reaction. However, non-offensive or non-move actions do not trigger Ruler Reactions.
• Special grenades like Sting and Ghost grenades should no longer appear as items in the Avenger's inventory after missions.
• Soldiers that are left behind on missions should now be captured (or killed if they're bleeding out) instead of returning to the Avenger. Mostly affects stunned/unconscious units.
• Purifiers and drones have been removed from reinforcements.
• The reinforcements alert is working again (the coloured one in the top left corner of the screen).
• Units recover properly from the Arc Thrower stun now.
• The LW2 flamethrower targeting is back! Burninators rejoice!! (This basically means you can step out to use the flamethrower and enemy units stepping out from high cover will get hit)
• The Blaster Launcher targeting has been fixed.
• Rapid Fire no longer has a cooldown.
• Various abilities like Death From Above, Hit And Run, etc. now work properly when you regain control of a mind-controlled unit after the start of your turn, for example if you flashbang the mind controller with another soldier.
• Double Tap is now working again with Death From Above, allowing the latter to trigger on both Double Tap shots.
• ADVENT Rocketeers can no longer shoot through obstructions, like walls.
• The officer perk Focus Fire is now working properly, i.e. it's increasing the aim bonus with every shot on the target.

Campaign/Geoscape Changes

• There is now a Second Wave option to enable the Chosen when you start the campaign (click on the Advanced Options button of the campaign start screen to get there). The old config setting no longer has any effect.
• The Chosen will now activate automatically after you complete your first Liberation Network Tower mission successfully.
• Chosen are now guaranteed to appear on the first mission after activation unless it is one of the mission types they are excluded from
• The chance for Chosen to appear on other (non-excluded) missions is a flat 20%, but under infiltrating a mission will increase this chance, while over infiltrating will decrease it
• Faction influence can now be gained without having the Chosen active by liberating regions under the control of a faction's Chosen adversary (they have one even if the Chosen aren't active)
• The Chosen-related monthly report screens should now be skipped if they aren't active.
• The Covert Actions for facility leads and Avatar progress reduction are now unique, meaning you can only complete the once per faction per campaign.
• The Gone To Ground dark event (it shuts the Black Market down for a period of time) has been remov...

1.6.0 alpha 6

Welcome to a new version of Long War 2 [WOTC]!

This is a small alpha to fix some major issues with the alpha 5 release and because the beta is likely to be a while in arriving.

Mission Changes

• The bug that caused melee attacks to sometimes hang the game should be fixed now 🤞
• The stat penalties from red fog will no longer persist once a wounded solder has healed, although this won't fix soldiers that are already suffering from such penalties sadly
• The dropship and other mission intro screens will now display the correct squad

Campaign/Geoscape Changes

• SMGs no longer get the damage bonus from the assault rifle breakthrough
• Fixed some bugs with squad management (see #302 and #314)
• Some soldier classes could roll XCOM-row perks that were also in the class tree, but that has now been fixed

1.6.0 alpha 5

Welcome to a new version of Long War 2 [WOTC]!

This is probably the last alpha version we will release, with the next one scheduled to be the first beta. That will mark feature completeness for the 1.6 release.

Edit Make sure you grab the alpha-5.1 hot fix below if you don't have it yet. It fixes a bug in which psi operatives take a long time to rank up.

Edit 2 The LW_Overhaul.u and LW_Toolbox_Integrated.u files below contain patches for squad management bugs when selecting squads for mission and red fog permanently lowering a soldier's stats. To apply these patches, simply copy these files over the existing ones you have in Steam\steamapps\common\XCOM 2\XCom2-WarOfTheChosen\XComGame\Mods\LongWarOfTheChosen\Script.

Notes

• We strongly recommend you start a new campaign with this version!
• When starting a new campaign, make sure you disable the Lost & Abandoned Mission.
• If you want to play with the Chosen active, you will need to set the ACTIVATE_CHOSEN variable in XComLW_Overhaul.ini to true, even if you already did this with a previous version.
• If you want to use the Extended Information! mod, see the installation page for more details.

Mission Changes

• The graze band is now active and we display the shot break down, including the graze chance (note that the "hit chance" now includes the chance to graze as well as crit)
• Your soldiers can no longer get Ability Points from tactical events, such as from high-ground or flanking shots
• Soldiers get more Ability Points per rank up to offset this
• You can now promote faction soldiers from the post-mission screen (the one where they're walking from the Skyranger)
• Yellow alert works properly now and units will take offensive actions, like shooting you on reveal
• Relays and transmitters that you need to destroy/protect now have LW2 levels of health, i.e. higher for objects you need to destroy and lower for objects you need to protect, making these missions harder
• Trojan now works properly, preventing affected units from taking an action when the Trojan effect ends
• Burnout now applies the smoke to the Technical's tile
• Death from Above can only activate once per turn now (mostly only affects Darklance)
• Snap Shot can now Headshot
• Most, if not all, of the officer abilities now work, like Oscar Mike (which wasn't applying the mobility bonus before)
• ADVENT Rocketeers have their rocket launchers back and can use them — beware!
• ADVENT Priests now use their psionic abilities
• Haven Advisers now return to the Avenger after Defend the Haven missions
• The number of rebels you can rescue on Rescue Resistance Contacts missions now matches the reward, i.e. if the reward is three rebels/rookies, you will only see three prisoners on the map, rather than 3-6
• A full complement of enemy units will now reliably spawn on Rendezvous missions and units with valuable corpses will appear a little more often (officers, drones, stun lancers)
• Soldiers can now be carried out from missions multiple times in a campaign — previously, if they were carried out on any mission and then needed to be carried out on any subsequent mission, they would be stuck on the map and you would lose that soldier
• Hostile civilians will now run away from XCOM rather than walk
• The floodlights on HQ assaults are no longer red

Campaign/Geoscape Changes

• New Promotion Screen By Default has been integrated and is used for the LW2 soldier classes
• LW2: View Infiltrating Squad has been integrated, which means you can see much more detail on the soldiers that are infiltrating a mission
• You can no longer select/purchase multiple class skills that are at the same rank, such as Snapshot and Death from Above for Sharpshooters
• Soldiers now have access to more AWC/XCOM perks and those perks aren't completely ineffective — previously you could get things like Quickburn on non-Technicals
• Soldiers how have access to the pistol perks once the Training Center is built (you'll need to scroll down in the promotion/Training Center screen to see them)
• SPARKs no longer heal while infiltrating
• SPARKs can now be assigned to the repair slot in Engineering
• You can no longer send previously-wounded SPARKs on multiple missions concurrently
• You can no longer research certain techs or build certain items before the prerequisites have been met (applies to things like battle scanners, Mechanized Warfare, mimic beacons, etc.)
• The Avatar Progress bar is now working properly and includes pips from facilities you haven't discovered yet
• The mission loading screens now display the correct squad — previously they displayed the last squad sent on a mission
• Shadowkeeper and laser pistols now show their -1 mobility penalty in the soldier screen
• The correct alerts/dialogs are displayed on the Geoscape after a Network Tower mission is successfully completed

1.6.0 alpha 4

Welcome to a new version of Long War 2 [WOTC]!

Note When starting a new campaign, make sure you disable the Lost & Abandoned Mission.

Mission Changes

• XCOM soldiers now have a chance to bleed out istead of die outright (they always died beforehand)
• Balanced will loss and recovery - soldiers are much less likely to become tired in just one mission, and higher will means less chance to lose will when new enemy units are seen
• Rendezvous mission now has proper enemies (no extra Faceless civilians!) - increases availability of important corpses, like drones and stun lancers
• Haven Advisors will now deploy in retaliations and mini retaliations with all their configured equipment and abilities
• Reinforcement-only missions now generate XP for XCOM soldiers
• Fixed XP for missions involving the Lost - XCOM soldiers were getting less than they should
• Reworked the Smash 'N' Grab mission to encourage more fighting vs stealth:
  • It's now evac with flare
  • It has a longer reinforcement timer
• Significantly reduced rewards from the Smash 'N' Grab - the resources gained before were way too much
• Rescue rings no longer disappear from unrescued rebels on Haven Retaliations and Invasions

Campaign/Geoscape Changes

• Chosen will now activate after your first successfuly completed Liberation 2 if you set ACTIVATE_CHOSEN to true in the mod's XComLW_Overhaul.ini file
• Fixed Dark Event UI Display - you can now properly switch between pending and active events
• Added vigilance and force level information to the Geoscape, as well as potential enemy numbers for missions
• Reduced the potential duration of Undying Loyalty and High Alert events to 12-18 days (from 28)
• Removed Collateral Damage, Stiletto Rounds, and Signal Jamming dark events as they were largely ineffective
• Fixed Psi Lab upgrade to allow 2 Scientists and 2 Psi Trainees
• Psi Offense is now displayed for rookies in the soldier list once Psionics has been researched
• Psi Initiates now get 3 basic psi abilities on top of Quick Study after initial training - they were just receiving Quick Study before, leaving them pretty useless
• SPARKs now require you to complete Lost Towers or research Mechanized Warfare before you can build them, regardless of your campaign settings
• You can now build upgraded SPARK weapons and armour
• You can now train officers if you have the New Promotion Screen By Default mod enabled
• Fixed accumulation of supplies from regional income
• Rebels will now level up in havens
• Removed the Reusable Weapon Upgrade Breakthrough since weapon mods are already reusable in LW2
• Made it slightly easier to detect missions in the first month for Commander and Legend to reduce the chance of bad RNG crippling the start of the campaign

1.6.0 alpha 3

Instructions for installing the mod can be found here.

The most notable changes in this release include:

• Yellow alert actions
• An updated Smash 'N' Grab mission (see below)
• Removal of the Counter BeagleRush Maneuver
• Patrolling is fixed and pods no longer beeline for your position

You can find a more complete list of changes here.

Caution The new Smash 'N' Grab mission now requires you to evac. On top of that, continous reinforcements start shortly after the enemy see you, so be prepared to mark crates and then run away fairly promptly. Getting into extended firefights is unlikely to end well!

Download here