XCOM 2: Facilities

[Part of the XCOM 2 story]

Since hitting facilities really damages the Avatar project that's what the soldiers are sent to do, and a few more give their lives to the cause, the most horrifying being IzzBee being impregnated by a chryssalid (who are exactly the same from last time) - eventually dying on the field from its fluids and was turned into a fleshy birth sack that her team mates destroyed before full gestation occurred (which is +3 chryssalids on the field).

Also lost Katz who was obliterated by a pair of sectopods (huge, two legged war machines), Aaron who was beheaded by an archon, Squidman Dan who took cover behind a flaming truck (carrying explosives), Mickey and Rocio exploded by MEC missiles, and Cash who was melted by Andromedon acid.

These things are basically tanks.

During this time Jane Kelly managed to skulljack a codex which spawned what the science team refers to as an avatar, which her squad promptly dealt with as well as a psionic gate guarded by a large floating ball (which hides a psionic tentacle alien) which were all transported back to the Avenger for further study. All this has almost put the Avatar project back at square one, and the aliens are so pissed they finally send a UFO to hunt us down.

Fun Tip: If there is a "fixed" extraction point in a mission and it is not on ground level and somewhere inconvenient / dangerous, blow it up to force it to move.

State of Decay 2: Odd Friends of Haven

[Part of the Diary of Zombies]

Hearing that Trumbull Valley is open again, Zeb, Hailey and Kraken from Hamlet Squad arrive to the radio welcome of Ray Santos, "the valley's protector", but find rumors of it being safe are false as it is home to plague hearts just like everywhere else. Luckily, since Kraken assisted an odd stranger named "Clutch pinya" (multiplayer for 15 minutes) she was gifted some godlike (definitely hacked) weaponry from him: a trio of automatic weapons with 999 bullets all in one clip!

Mmm, that looks legit...

Hailey and Zeb use these weapons and within the first day eliminate all the plague hearts around (standard difficulty only) and start doing jobs for bounty salesman Cash Beaumont and a group of scientists up in the mountains working on some computer gizmo called CLEO. This group includes Dr. Hoffman, IzzBee the hacker and reformed thug Mickey Wilkerson who comes along for some scavenging missions and find the grave of someone named Malik while doing so.

Taking the leadership position, Hailey decides to go recruit loner Al, gardener Poldo, sexter Raney, soldier Rhino, electician Buck, and lawman Anselmo to move from their checkpoint base to a Red Talon fort at the fairgrounds where ex-Red Talon Chavez and his buddy Beebo Bee assist in getting things running again and after over a week of helping the scientists they eventually them to visit the base to install CLEO's Haven defense protocol.

The zombies launch a siege during Haven's installation but are outmatched by the guns the team has. More so when the Haven finally activates as it boils the head of any zombie within safe zone distance to make their heads explode! Zombie sieges are now a thing of the past.

Insight: Haven is fueled by spare parts. LOTS if you don't have power and water. Only 25 per day if you do.

State of Decay 2: The Gauntlet

[Part of the Diary of Zombies]

Despite how sneaky Quincy is (he's so sneaky that he lets all other companions sneak) it is new recruit Isaac, who joined to get away from his husband, who has the best solution to harvesting bloaters: he can produce scentblock, which effectively makes the users undetectable to zombies. With this, Helena and Keesha go on a harvesting spree while Quincy gains a new partner in Chavez, a Red-Talon merc abandoned in the region to help hacker IzzBee take control of the AI called CLEO to provide support drops for the team.

The girls harvesting results in 31 plague busters, while Quincy manages to make some extra ammo and masterwork rifles in preparation for the assault on Marshall back at base. Malik and Logan clear a pub near the outer most plague wall of Marshall for easy access to the gear then Captain Logan sends the civilian away to handle the siege personally.

Winners use high ground.

Using Malik's small car as a combat platform, Logan destroys the first wall but is thrown from the roof by a plague juggernaut! Luckily he has spare busters to take down the horde and the big guy (2 to down a jugg) before resupplying an working on the next three walls - all of which have great firing positions from on top of containers! It really comes down to using every single plague buster and bullet though, with some wiley-pete grenades at the end to defeat the gauntlet of plague walls - and destroying the last one seems to kill all the zombies in the area!

As expected, there is something in the middle of all of it - a CLEO drop pod which seems to be the source of the plague!? Dr. Hoffman gets to work in finding answers but none are revealed as this results in a map victory!

Insight: By now you know zombies are vertically challenged so always look for high perches to fight from. Pressing jump THEN forward lets you climb higher stuff than if you press forward AND jump.

State of Decay 2: Network Expedition

[Part of the Diary of Zombies]

Quincy and Helena arrive in Trumbull Valley in search of Ray Santos, an old friend of their boss. The first person they find is Malik though, and for the little task of clearing out his old base he is happy to provide information and so they do this, taking his small yet spacious car to Jurassic Junction - the biggest base ever! Quincy uses his stealth skills to farm up some plague samples and supplies afterwards before he and Helena head off to the coordinates Malik provides - finding Ray and his mechanic gang to be having easily solved radio problems.

Sometimes cars just fly off on their own. Best fix if you are at base is to quit and load.

One of Ray's associates, Keesha, also reveals they are having "rent" problems with Mickey - a scum bandit thug in the area who is easily scared off. Keesha decides to join their proactive group thanks to this and helps establish outposts in town while at the same time avoiding plague hearts as for a change, that doesn't seem to be the main goal here... instead that is spelled out when Keesha and Malik meet Captain Logan, the last soldier in the valley, and his ally Dr. Hoffman. They explain the military had come in and were wiped out trying destroy a new type of growth: a plague wall!

He demonstrates the resilience of one such plague wall at a downed aircraft. Only with Dr. Hoffman's newly invented "plague buster" grenades crafted from plague bloaters can the hard outer shell be exposed (temporarily) to damage the bulbous growth within. Like plague hearts, the walls also summon zombies to defend it but with the supply of "plague busters" the Captain brings, they aren't a problem (lethal to them too) as the plane wall is destroyed.

Logan then explains the town of Marshall is surounded by plague walls, and believe that whatever lies in the center is the key to undoing the blood plague. After collecting equipment to let them produce their own plague busters, the Network Expedition crew is tasked with the onerous task of harvesting plague bloaters.

Insight: Heartland has no customizable difficulty setting. All zeds have blood plague and you have a limited pool of fixed survivors, however all these survivors are pretty strong and the combat difficulty itself is below dread since you can ram your car into many enemies AND there are many cars available.