Understanding the Red Shield in XCOM 2: A Comprehensive Guide
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The red shield in XCOM 2 is a critical visual indicator, immediately alerting you to a dangerous situation. It appears when your soldier is flanked, meaning an enemy has a direct line of sight, bypassing the benefits of your current cover. This places your operative in a vulnerable position, leaving them susceptible to higher hit chances and increased critical damage. In essence, the red shield is a warning, signaling that your cover is compromised and your soldier is at significant risk.
What Does Being Flanked Mean?
Flanking is a crucial concept in XCOM 2’s combat system. When a unit is behind cover, they gain a defense bonus, making it harder for enemies to hit them. However, if an enemy moves to a position where they have a clear shot at your soldier without the obstruction of that cover, they have flanked that unit. This results in the disappearance of the cover bonus, indicated by a red shield icon.
The key thing to understand is that the red shield doesn’t simply mean that the soldier’s cover is somehow broken. It means that the enemy’s position allows them to bypass the cover. Thus, if your soldier is in the open with no cover, they are also technically flanked and will be shown with the red shield.
How Does This Impact Combat?
When a unit is flanked (indicated by the red shield), the following occurs:
- Loss of Cover Bonus: The primary benefit of cover is negated. This means your operative no longer receives the defense bonus provided by the high or low cover.
- Increased Hit Chance: Enemies attacking a flanked unit receive a significant bonus to their aim stat, making it far easier for them to hit.
- Bonus to Critical Hit Chance: Flanked units are also more vulnerable to critical hits. This can result in much higher damage than a normal hit, greatly increasing the risk to your soldiers.
- No Additional Damage: It is important to note that while the red shield represents being flanked, it only affects hit and critical hit chance. It does not increase the damage dealt by enemy units directly.
- Visual Indicator: The red shield is the visual cue, replacing the blue or yellow shield (representing safe cover and low cover, respectively). When you hover your cursor over a potential square to move to, if the shield by your cursor is red, that means the operative will be flanked if they move there.
Strategic Implications
The red shield is not just a warning, but a vital piece of information to help you make strategic decisions. Recognizing a flanked position is crucial for:
- Repositioning Your Units: Knowing when your soldier is flanked allows you to reposition them to a safe position where they are not vulnerable. This might include moving them to a position with better cover, or setting up crossfires to protect your units.
- Prioritizing Targets: Focusing fire on enemies who have flanked your units is often a priority, as these are the enemies posing an immediate threat.
- Using Abilities Wisely: Deploy abilities, such as smoke grenades or suppression fire, to help protect your flanked units or create opportunities to break the flank.
- Understanding cover: If a soldier has a red shield, they will always be vulnerable, it doesn’t matter if they are high cover or low cover. You must understand where the enemy has sight to them to plan your moves.
How to Avoid Being Flanked
- Awareness of Enemy Positions: Be constantly aware of where enemies are located. If there are any open flanks, the enemy will use them.
- Cover Awareness: Always be mindful of the line of sight from enemy positions to your soldiers.
- Flanking Enemies: Turn the tables by flanking your enemies.
- Utilizing Overwatch: Use Overwatch to discourage enemy advances.
- Grenade Placement: Destroying cover can be a double edged sword, but if you can remove cover from your enemy, you can potentially flank them.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Here are 15 FAQs to further your understanding of the red shield and its role in XCOM 2.
1. What’s the difference between a red shield and a blue shield?
A blue shield signifies that your soldier is in cover and not flanked, receiving a defense bonus. A red shield means your soldier is flanked, losing any defense bonuses and becoming vulnerable to higher hit chances and critical hits.
2. Does a red shield mean I’m taking more damage?
No, a red shield means you have increased vulnerability. While you’re not taking more damage on a regular hit, the increased hit and critical chance can result in higher damage being inflicted on your unit.
3. Can I get a red shield even if I’m behind high cover?
Yes, being behind high cover doesn’t grant immunity to flanking. If an enemy has a clear line of sight that bypasses the cover, your unit is still considered flanked and displayed with a red shield.
4. Does the red shield appear on enemies too?
Yes, the red shield will appear on an enemy if they are flanked, or in the open.
5. Can a unit with high defense avoid the downsides of a red shield?
High defense will provide an advantage against being hit, but if they are flanked, they will lose the cover bonus. They are therefore still vulnerable to the increased hit chance and critical hit chance, they just have a slightly higher base defense.
6. Does the red shield also appear if you’re in the open?
Yes, a red shield will also appear if you are in the open, as you have no defense from cover and are technically always flanked.
7. Can my soldiers flank enemies using the same principles?
Absolutely. You can use the same flanking principles to your advantage, positioning your soldiers to bypass enemy cover and expose them to increased hit and critical hit chances.
8. Does a red shield affect all attacks?
Yes, any attack from a flanked position will have increased hit and critical hit chance.
9. Can I use concealment to avoid being flanked?
Yes, if an enemy is unaware of your unit, they can not flank that unit. If the enemy reveals the unit, they can then flank the unit if they have a line of sight.
10. How do I deal with multiple enemies flanking a single soldier?
The best response to a situation like this is to either reposition your units to safer spots, or to try and remove the threat that flanks you. Use suppressing fire, grenades, and abilities to remove threats, and focus your damage on the enemies that flank you.
11. Does the difficulty setting affect the effect of flanking?
No, the effects of flanking remain consistent across different difficulty settings in XCOM 2. However, enemies become more aggressive, tactical, and accurate on higher difficulty settings, meaning they may flank you more often.
12. Can I use my surroundings to flank enemies?
Yes, by positioning your units carefully, you can use corners, buildings, and other cover to create flanking opportunities.
13. Does the red shield also apply to psi-attacks and abilities?
The red shield primarily concerns regular attacks, and will not affect psi-attacks or abilities. Mind control, for example, does not gain a bonus from flanking, although it does ignore defense.
14. How can I proactively prepare for flanks?
Use the environment, positioning, and enemy awareness to proactively prepare for flanks, using high cover and setting up your own flanking moves. The more you learn about enemy behaviors, the easier it becomes to plan out your moves.
15. Can the Red Shield be useful for strategic planning?
Absolutely, seeing the red shield appears when hovering your soldier gives you the chance to reassess and potentially change your position to a safer location. This is a key part of gameplay in XCOM 2.
By understanding the implications of the red shield, you can gain a significant advantage in combat and make better strategic decisions to keep your XCOM operatives safe. This crucial mechanic is central to XCOM 2’s tactical gameplay and mastering it is key to victory.