Just in case there's anyone here who's actually playing and not whining about the controls or glitches (of which I have none), I could use some help with a mission.

I'm on the last one in the first city, so not particularly high level characters. In the first room I encountered 5 or 6 guys in the next room, open door, all with readied cover fire. So, as soon as one of my guys gets a line on one, he's on the ground. Even Bear can't take the damage and eventually I fail the mission due to someone dying. Rafe can't throw grenades into open ground, just targets, right?

Oh, and the initial starting point has two windows and a door into the only room I can go into with two guys in it so I can't stealth kill them fast enough without them sounding the alarm.

So how do I clear this room?

Having restarted three times now (forgot to save) I can tell you I've had three different starting setups, so stating which specific city might be an idea, otherwise any help offered will be pretty random and possibly of no use to you.

Unfortunately I dont know - havent played enough but there are couple of users in other threads with experience dating back to the games original release - I'm sure they can and will be able to clear things up for you!

I eventually got through it. Bear finally survived the initial onslaught and then killed 4 while berserk. I ended up with 4 wounded agents so the Rio opening will have to be very stealthy, but still.

Actually now that I've recently started playing this again (after seeing it on GOG), there are once again times where it frustrates the heck out of me. I remember once thinking I was good enough to play on the hardest level - where you can't save during a mission... Suffice to say, I wouldn't recommend doing that, unless you're a masochist...

Anyway, there are things that can help in situations like things, but some of them require perks to be unlocked. As you play through, I'd recommend trying to level everyone up evenly if possible so you can count on everyone in a mission.

I was also recently reminded of one of my favourite things about this game - watching Bear totally lose it and single-handedly take out half of the enemies on the map!

A few notes:

- Rafe CAN throw grenades on the floor between enemies - but the place on the floor needs to be both in his LOS and between two (or more) enemies. If there's only one enemy he'll only be able to target them directly.

- Later on Rafe can get proxy mines, which you can throw at the spaces in front of doors and corridors (I think). As their name suggests, these don't go off till the enemy run through them.

- All missions have two starting locations. If you bring Archer (as I'm sure you know) you can split your team and go through both at once. That way if one path is full of enemies, you might be able to get the other half of your team up behind them. Personally I ALWAYS play assault missions from both entry points, since you can bring your entire team on those missions, and it allows for better tactics.

- The second-level enemies on each map are effectively "Seargents" - they aren't just more accurate/deadly than the lowest level enemies, but they actually order the lowest-level enemies around. If you take them out, the lowest-level enemies revert to a really basic AI consisting of running towards the last heard sound and opening fire, whereas if they're given orders by Seargents then they're more tactical.

- The highest-level enemies are often still the deadliest by themselves, but they don't order anyone around.

- Crouching will make you 50% harder to hit, as will standing behind cover. This effect stacks (so the enemy's chance to hit you will be reduced by 50% and then 50% again).

- Being prone reduces accuracy by 50% again on top of those - so if your guy just got shot and is lying on the ground, and the enemy is still on "overwatch" - skip him for now (use "wait"). Move your other guys until (hopefully) the enemy gets a shot, wherein they will either choose a different position or waste their turns attacking at reduced accuracy. THEN let your guy stand, and either get him out or take out the enemy.

- If you get a bad starting setup, just restart the mission. Setup on missions is random so you might get a better enemy placement.

- Archer's GO CODE is useful to get a free shot - but not sure if it can bypass opportunity fire (can't remember).

- It's worthwhile to use the Sniper chick to get her experience up until she can become a medic, so you can use her to heal your guys. Doing this allows them to leave the mission bruised instead of injured (so they start the next mission at full armor), plus with the full medic training she can resurrect downed team members (within 3 turns). I realise that it sucks to use her at first since she seems crap, but once she gets first aid she's much more useful, and even better with first aid. One game I left her languishing on the bench most missions, but regretted it when I needed her skills (which she didn't have yet!).

- Personally I like to upgrade Rafe to use gas grenades, since that makes him viable on a stealth team. Plus they're guaranteed to take an enemy out if they hit.

- Number and quality of guards is dependent on the total experience level of all team members on the mission - so using less experienced people means less/crappier guards.

- Final thing: A lot of what I've written here is explained (sort of) in the in-game help documentation - including the formulas for calculating guards etc. A tactic mentioned in those docs which is useful is to have two teams - one loud, one quiet - so the enemy head for the loud team, and you can use your stealthy team to come up behind them.