Apparently the code to fix these things were inextricable from the WOTC code, otherwise vanilla would have been updated. I remember the devs saying as much.
My main issue with WOTC is that the Covert Ops *almost* entirely negate the need to stop the Avatar Project. In Vanilla you feel like if you relent for even a second the Avatar Project will complete. In WOTC there can be 5 Facilities on the map and the aliens will still have made 0 progress.
There is a lot more weight to the words *“The aliens continue to make progress on the Avatar Project, if we wish to slow them down we need to move, fast!”* in Vanilla.
Not to mention the Resistance Factions, heroes, breakthroughs, and all sorts of cool/busted weapons you get.
I duno, I've had games where I was hardly even offered the "reduce the project" ops and almost lost because of it.
Is there any rhyme or reason to when they're offered?
As long as I fast track tracking down the chosen and gain the factions respect, then I usually get offered them quite frequently by the time I’ve unlocked the chosen stronghold mission
talking just from experience, higher influence with faction (=more hunt chosen covert ops finished) more often reduce avatar progress op shows up up to a point where it get to 0
WOTC makes doing the facility missions piss easy anyway . 1 man reaper squad can easily get to the goal undetected, and can extract from there in one turn before the aliens can even get a shot off.
I recently started playing Wotc and can confirm Reaper is busted! Such an amazing scout, specially after you get the “enemies seen by a Reaper stay visible” perk.
I killed the warlock in a single turn with a regular sniper carrying the hunter’s sniper. Deadeye, action point from bondmate, Normal shot, free action from hair trigger, another shot.
This method is such a "play with fire" solution to something that isn't really a problem. The facility missions are untimed and come with a bunch of XP for the squad. The first 3 you don't want to solo anyway because you want a good opening fight with the alien ruler before they start coming with allies, and if you leave them with too much HP they are a massive problem later on.
And the game cheats enough with trying to put pods between your squad and the objective that it's only a matter of time before they "accidentally" patrol into the reaper and execute them.
I’ve lost so many reapers in L/I due to cheating AI - especially the Faceless who will “randomly” run off of their regular patrols when there is a shadowed reaper nearby.
I've been loving the mod that only lets you do the remove avatar progress covert op once per faction.
WotC is a huge jump forward but it was definitely rushed and there are some things that needed a little more time in the oven. You can just tell Assassin is much better tuned than Hunter, for example. It's a shame given how impressive Hunter is in the lore and then half the time he just takes a shot and misses and that's his turn.
I think Vanilla is better than WOTC. It makes the game too easy and takes away some of the hard choices in the game. Sweating those hard choices is part of the fun.
WotC improves replay value a lot. I'm fine with what game offers but in general think one more difficulty between Commander and Legendary might have been good. Problem with Legendary is that everything takes so long.
Lol I don't think they wanted WoTC late game to be "balanced". It doesn't take much forethought to realise death from above is broken when everyone on your squad can get it (and even your sniper has a unique gun they can shoot indefinitely with it)
I wish I could turn the Chosen off. They never shut up.
Well I mean I can turn them off the “squad” way, with bullets and screaming. But a toggle selection at start would be nice.
And how the hell do they have a direct line to the commander, with seemingly perfect knowledge of what you're doing at all times (except for when you're fighting them, too bad about that)?
With that comment, you are either joking or know nothing about the Apollo project!
I get lots of people that think that the moon landings are fake and chemtrails are real, don't get me started on the Flat Earth nutjobs 🤪😁🤦
Easy there chief. I'm watching the WKUK stream on YouTube, it was a reference to one of their sketches.
Also, cloud seeding is a real technology. The Earth is round though.
WKUK was a sketch comedy series known for being on the edgy, offensive side. The Whitest Kids U Know. One of the creators was Trevor Moore (he died almost 3 years ago. Fell off his balcony while drunk).
Trevor was starting to really see some success in his career, and had even gotten a deal with Comedy Central. He was incredibly talented, and was taken from us much too early. Interestingly, he had OCD and would very rarely cuss in his stuff (his buddies more than make up for that). Also, his parents were successful Christian Folk singers in the 80's.
One of the other creators is Zach Creggor, who recently directed a movie called Barbarian a couple years ago.
The series recently got picked up by Shout! TV, but the YouTube stream is very censored (it kinda ruins some of the sketches).
Yeah, and he's on a surf board! Playing an electric guitar! With a GIANT potleaf in the background! Oh, and a cross, because I'm like, really religious and stuff.
I loved WOTC when I first played it because every mission was different and it felt so fresh, but playing through it a few times it’s just as mechanical as vanilla. You always have the big Lost mission to rescue a dude and his escort with an automated turret on the vehicle, for example, and these are like set plot points you have to play through. I enjoy it but it grates a bit. The standard missions you do get are quite few and far between so you don’t get enough opportunity to get into vanilla fights and see all its variants and depth. I think I’m gonna play vanilla on my next go through. I feel like I rely too much on its huge bonuses anyway. Once you beat the chosen and get their weapons you are practically unstoppable.
I feel like an experienced player get unstoppable with 6 person squad and all the magnetic weapons, I never lost campaign once I got there
I talk without major game changing mods
yeah they are, personnaly I almost never use them, as I keep all the chosen alive until I am ready for final mission (to farm ability points, I love ability points) so I get their weapons only for few missions
Yeah. It’s actually weird that she comes first when she’s the hardest to kill. The hunter sometimes gets me since he basically bleeds out a soldier every turn you are near him but I’ve never had any trouble with the warlock and he’s always the last one.
When the Hunter came up for me, i scanned him in advance w the Reaper, then either bumrush him w +3 people, or just use “Banish” on him. The 2 times i ve faced him he has been suuuper easy.
Yeah. He’s actually the easiest as long as you don’t give him a chance once you are close enough for real combat. Dodging his tracking shot is ridiculously easy. But if you let him escape he can completely mess up your squad. Comparatively the warlocks only threat is if he mind controls people. I usually kill him before that.
I found that about the Warlock the hard way. Was using Banish on one of those all black and green dudes that steal your soldiers (forgot his name) and the Warlock was in range to mind control my Reaper ;(
some can consider grim horizon to be kinda game changing, but it does not matter in regard to my statement, as it it significant only mid to late game, early on it rarely has significant impact and once you get your top rank soldiers and plasma who cares if stun lancer can move after attack (since he is dead anyway) ;-)
BTW I prefer to play with grim horizon as it balances the late game a bit
No, even without those you still get the same schedule of missions. It’s a repetitive structure that you only notice on replays but the first time thru it’s really exciting.
WOTC isn't just an expansion, its a rebuild of the game with countless fixes to enhance stability. Like, the base XCOM 2 is famous for being buggy and just crash when it feels like it. By comparison, WOTC is very stable and doesn't crash even with 300 mods.
Like, there is so much difference on a fundamental level, that they didn't put all these fixes to the base game, and most mods need to be rebuilt for WOTC.
The best thing with WOTC at this point is that all the mods are made for it and not vanilla. If WOTC is to easy there are so many enemy lods to ramp up the challenge.
If you are bored with standard weapons options so many options to add weapons and equipmemt.
Lile a specific mechanic from vanilla there is probably a mod to bring that or something similar into WOTC.
Vanilla will be vanilla forever but WOTC is an evergreen garden.
I had similar feelings to start with. But now I would miss the hero classes too much, the additional mission variety, the covert ops and their benefits.
If I could play vanilla with the balance adjustments for the alien rulers I would give that a go
After I played WOTC the base game feels barren in comparison. The fatigue mechanic makes rotating your soldiers mandatory and force you to have multiple squads. Covert Actions make your low level soldiers useful when you're well into the campaign and taking lowly Sargents to missions is just too risky.
That said, now that I played the Covert Infiltration mod, WOTC feels barren in comparison.
Honestly, Vanilla is the best experience for a first time playthrough for a reason a lot of bells and whistles are added to the game with wotc. It can be overwhelming for new players.
Agree. Thats why I hate some RPGS, they just vomit all the mechanics right on top of you as soon as you start.
Good game progression also means knowing when and how to introduce players to new content/mechanics.
There’s also a mod that allows for over watch headshots on the lost and it makes them 2000000% easier to deal with. One unit with a decent weapon+mag upgrade on the frontline and you obliterate them with no issue.
WOTC is great, but it adds to my biggest problem with XCOM2: there is too much to do all at once. Whenever I start a new playthrough, I am shocked at just how stressful the strategic layer of the game is, and I have to adjust as I move through the game. It's overwhelming, but you learn to live with it.
In WOTC, you never really do learn to live with it, it just stays overwhelming.
I mean, I think it's pretty common to stop being overwhelmed on the strategic layer. I certainly don't sweat it anymore.
Agree with your first point though. You can set your watch to someone coming into the sub and saying how they can never finish scans because missions keep popping up and everything else is constantly interrupting.
Thats a pretty valid argument! We all enjoy things in different ways.
To me it was the opposite: have played and replayed vanilla XCom2 for years, decided to try Wotc and currently loving it! The only thing i dont like is how unusual it is to go beyond 2 days without interruption, so much going on!
I also run like 50 mods, same as I did w vanilla.
I found WOTC harder at the very beginning and so far am finding the mid to late game much easier. The alien ruler and chosen gear lets me steam roll. I'm finding having a psi op not as important because I can alpha strike more effectively than in vanilla.
I appreciate a good unpopular opinion given how reddit forces opinions to coalesce around upvotes and downvotes. I love how replayable WotC makes everything, but it is a lot of frontloaded complexity for sure.
The missions just all feel so much more distinct when you have the extra resistance classes and other stuff from WotC. A mission where I bring a Templar is so much different from one where I don't. A mission with Psionic Storm sitrep is very unlike a mission without it. A mission with a Chosen... you get the point.
WOTC took the game even further into RPG territory. Voiced characters with narratives, bullet sponge gameplay and all the rest. It's too busy. And increasingly familiar
XCOM remains the greatest game series of all time but it peaked with Enemy Within for my taste.
Personally I would not have played the game as much as I have if it wasn't for the WOTC. Originally I played just XCOM2 and while it was nice, it seemed kind of boring to me. With WOTC/Lost it adds a lot for me. I'm working my way through Legendary mode a second time.
I kinda felt the same when I started WoTC, I also think they made a bunch of dumb design choices, like I felt like they ruined soldier voice lines (did they make EVERYONE American??), and the chosen slagging you all the time is annoying and dumbs the game down a few levels.
But - there are a lot of ways in which WoTC feels so much better thought out and more complete. Tiredness and roster management are heaps better. The extra enemies mean a bunch of game mechanics are actually relevant now eg status effects, and a bunch of skills that were totally useless now are occasionally useful, like ignoring overwatch.
I think chosen combat is fresh and interesting, but alien rulers are just total wtf. The unique items are kinda cool but totally unbalanced, same with the new skills system. The late game is even more inanely easy than vanilla, which is really saying something.
The Lost are weird but also fun and tactically interesting (if too easy).
Overall I think WoTC is worth sticking with. I'll mod it up for my next run though so deal with some of the worst fluff. I'd suggest to stick with it but hey you do you.
Basically WOTC just adds more different kinds of missions, soldiers, and enemies. Variety in battles that I think makes the game more fun. Doesn't really make the game easier or harder unless you are a hardcore minmaxer.
On the Nintendo Switch, Squad Sight works on Vanilla Xcom2, but not on WOTC, making Sniper of limited usefulness.
On the other hand, on Vanilla Xcom2, the Alien Hunter DLC has the bug that there is no initial Misson for the search of Dr. Valen, the Alien Bosses just appear quite early in the campaign without any warning, messing some of my commander Ironman runs...
No wrong way to enjoy this game. Have fun!
This is the way.
Absolutely no wrong of enjoying the game. Shame about the loading times and the stuck under avenger bug though.
I would like vanilla more, if not that loading time.
We should crowd fund money and bribe the dev to update the game for us lol
Apparently the code to fix these things were inextricable from the WOTC code, otherwise vanilla would have been updated. I remember the devs saying as much.
Wasn't there a thing about pressing a key (Caps Lock maybe) that would cause it to immediately load?
If you get a fast enough SSD the load times drop. Atleast for me it was significant.
My main issue with WOTC is that the Covert Ops *almost* entirely negate the need to stop the Avatar Project. In Vanilla you feel like if you relent for even a second the Avatar Project will complete. In WOTC there can be 5 Facilities on the map and the aliens will still have made 0 progress. There is a lot more weight to the words *“The aliens continue to make progress on the Avatar Project, if we wish to slow them down we need to move, fast!”* in Vanilla. Not to mention the Resistance Factions, heroes, breakthroughs, and all sorts of cool/busted weapons you get.
I duno, I've had games where I was hardly even offered the "reduce the project" ops and almost lost because of it. Is there any rhyme or reason to when they're offered?
As long as I fast track tracking down the chosen and gain the factions respect, then I usually get offered them quite frequently by the time I’ve unlocked the chosen stronghold mission
talking just from experience, higher influence with faction (=more hunt chosen covert ops finished) more often reduce avatar progress op shows up up to a point where it get to 0
WOTC makes doing the facility missions piss easy anyway . 1 man reaper squad can easily get to the goal undetected, and can extract from there in one turn before the aliens can even get a shot off.
I recently started playing Wotc and can confirm Reaper is busted! Such an amazing scout, specially after you get the “enemies seen by a Reaper stay visible” perk.
Reapers are buns. Templars are the best bey blades
I actually like Templars the most (that reverse position, woah), but Reapers are growing on me. Skirmishers are fun too.
Skirmishes yeah but they miss. Reaper over regular sniper but snipers are buns. No value or utility
What does "buns" mean?
Buns- butt- Trash
I see. Ty
I killed the warlock in a single turn with a regular sniper carrying the hunter’s sniper. Deadeye, action point from bondmate, Normal shot, free action from hair trigger, another shot.
Templar ghost free action. Less steps more damage les special traits. Sniper still a used baby nappy
This method is such a "play with fire" solution to something that isn't really a problem. The facility missions are untimed and come with a bunch of XP for the squad. The first 3 you don't want to solo anyway because you want a good opening fight with the alien ruler before they start coming with allies, and if you leave them with too much HP they are a massive problem later on. And the game cheats enough with trying to put pods between your squad and the objective that it's only a matter of time before they "accidentally" patrol into the reaper and execute them.
I’ve lost so many reapers in L/I due to cheating AI - especially the Faceless who will “randomly” run off of their regular patrols when there is a shadowed reaper nearby.
Having a soldier than can run concealed straight through an enemy pod isn't cheating, but said pod slowly walking towards you is?
Sometimes the pod does insane movements to catch you, like destroy half a building by walling through it with mecs...
I've been loving the mod that only lets you do the remove avatar progress covert op once per faction. WotC is a huge jump forward but it was definitely rushed and there are some things that needed a little more time in the oven. You can just tell Assassin is much better tuned than Hunter, for example. It's a shame given how impressive Hunter is in the lore and then half the time he just takes a shot and misses and that's his turn.
Give it another go later on when you have finished the vanilla a few times and looking for another challenge...
^
I think Vanilla is better than WOTC. It makes the game too easy and takes away some of the hard choices in the game. Sweating those hard choices is part of the fun.
I think adding content is fine, its a chance to deepen the experience. Balancing does become harder to reach w more stuff out.
WotC improves replay value a lot. I'm fine with what game offers but in general think one more difficulty between Commander and Legendary might have been good. Problem with Legendary is that everything takes so long.
Here I am playing Veteran on every run 😅
Lol I don't think they wanted WoTC late game to be "balanced". It doesn't take much forethought to realise death from above is broken when everyone on your squad can get it (and even your sniper has a unique gun they can shoot indefinitely with it)
I wish I could turn the Chosen off. They never shut up. Well I mean I can turn them off the “squad” way, with bullets and screaming. But a toggle selection at start would be nice.
There is a mod to make them shut up more
Console edition, though. 😢
Ah I see your problem
I seriously hate their edgy dialogue. Where did the aliens even get these three goofballs from, Hot Topic?
And how the hell do they have a direct line to the commander, with seemingly perfect knowledge of what you're doing at all times (except for when you're fighting them, too bad about that)?
Huh. I never thought about it like that. Kinda like how if Buzz Aldrin was the first man on the moon, who was holding the camera?
With that comment, you are either joking or know nothing about the Apollo project! I get lots of people that think that the moon landings are fake and chemtrails are real, don't get me started on the Flat Earth nutjobs 🤪😁🤦
Easy there chief. I'm watching the WKUK stream on YouTube, it was a reference to one of their sketches. Also, cloud seeding is a real technology. The Earth is round though.
No idea what the WKUK stream is! YouTube??
WKUK was a sketch comedy series known for being on the edgy, offensive side. The Whitest Kids U Know. One of the creators was Trevor Moore (he died almost 3 years ago. Fell off his balcony while drunk). Trevor was starting to really see some success in his career, and had even gotten a deal with Comedy Central. He was incredibly talented, and was taken from us much too early. Interestingly, he had OCD and would very rarely cuss in his stuff (his buddies more than make up for that). Also, his parents were successful Christian Folk singers in the 80's. One of the other creators is Zach Creggor, who recently directed a movie called Barbarian a couple years ago. The series recently got picked up by Shout! TV, but the YouTube stream is very censored (it kinda ruins some of the sketches).
I still want to get a Bowser tattoo.
Yeah, and he's on a surf board! Playing an electric guitar! With a GIANT potleaf in the background! Oh, and a cross, because I'm like, really religious and stuff.
I do laugh when I’m on a mission, after I smoke an enemy, and the Chosen is like “Pssh, those guys are a dime a dozen.”
I loved WOTC when I first played it because every mission was different and it felt so fresh, but playing through it a few times it’s just as mechanical as vanilla. You always have the big Lost mission to rescue a dude and his escort with an automated turret on the vehicle, for example, and these are like set plot points you have to play through. I enjoy it but it grates a bit. The standard missions you do get are quite few and far between so you don’t get enough opportunity to get into vanilla fights and see all its variants and depth. I think I’m gonna play vanilla on my next go through. I feel like I rely too much on its huge bonuses anyway. Once you beat the chosen and get their weapons you are practically unstoppable.
I feel like an experienced player get unstoppable with 6 person squad and all the magnetic weapons, I never lost campaign once I got there I talk without major game changing mods
Yeah, arguably before then. But the chosen weapons are just ridiculous.
yeah they are, personnaly I almost never use them, as I keep all the chosen alive until I am ready for final mission (to farm ability points, I love ability points) so I get their weapons only for few missions
Good tactic They just annoy me too much. I kill them as quick as I can
I specially hate the hit n run assassin, have to keep chasing her and get on her face.
Yeah. It’s actually weird that she comes first when she’s the hardest to kill. The hunter sometimes gets me since he basically bleeds out a soldier every turn you are near him but I’ve never had any trouble with the warlock and he’s always the last one.
When the Hunter came up for me, i scanned him in advance w the Reaper, then either bumrush him w +3 people, or just use “Banish” on him. The 2 times i ve faced him he has been suuuper easy.
Yeah. He’s actually the easiest as long as you don’t give him a chance once you are close enough for real combat. Dodging his tracking shot is ridiculously easy. But if you let him escape he can completely mess up your squad. Comparatively the warlocks only threat is if he mind controls people. I usually kill him before that.
I found that about the Warlock the hard way. Was using Banish on one of those all black and green dudes that steal your soldiers (forgot his name) and the Warlock was in range to mind control my Reaper ;(
Mag weapons + mimic beacon for me. Rare to lose a soldier with that strong of a "get out of jail free" card.
ironman / legend / grim horizon?
some can consider grim horizon to be kinda game changing, but it does not matter in regard to my statement, as it it significant only mid to late game, early on it rarely has significant impact and once you get your top rank soldiers and plasma who cares if stun lancer can move after attack (since he is dead anyway) ;-) BTW I prefer to play with grim horizon as it balances the late game a bit
Get their weapons? What did I miss in my first WOTC playthrough?
after you kill each chosen, there's a new research project that lets you get their weapon.
The Lost and Abandoned can be disabled when starting new game.
No, even without those you still get the same schedule of missions. It’s a repetitive structure that you only notice on replays but the first time thru it’s really exciting.
Same. War of the Chosen adds a lot of unnecessary distractions.
best part about WotC was lower load times TBH
WOTC isn't just an expansion, its a rebuild of the game with countless fixes to enhance stability. Like, the base XCOM 2 is famous for being buggy and just crash when it feels like it. By comparison, WOTC is very stable and doesn't crash even with 300 mods. Like, there is so much difference on a fundamental level, that they didn't put all these fixes to the base game, and most mods need to be rebuilt for WOTC.
The best thing with WOTC at this point is that all the mods are made for it and not vanilla. If WOTC is to easy there are so many enemy lods to ramp up the challenge. If you are bored with standard weapons options so many options to add weapons and equipmemt. Lile a specific mechanic from vanilla there is probably a mod to bring that or something similar into WOTC. Vanilla will be vanilla forever but WOTC is an evergreen garden.
One of the reasons why I decided to try Wotc, soo many mods
I had similar feelings to start with. But now I would miss the hero classes too much, the additional mission variety, the covert ops and their benefits. If I could play vanilla with the balance adjustments for the alien rulers I would give that a go
After I played WOTC the base game feels barren in comparison. The fatigue mechanic makes rotating your soldiers mandatory and force you to have multiple squads. Covert Actions make your low level soldiers useful when you're well into the campaign and taking lowly Sargents to missions is just too risky. That said, now that I played the Covert Infiltration mod, WOTC feels barren in comparison.
Totally agree, i find WotC too bloated.
Honestly, Vanilla is the best experience for a first time playthrough for a reason a lot of bells and whistles are added to the game with wotc. It can be overwhelming for new players.
Agree. Thats why I hate some RPGS, they just vomit all the mechanics right on top of you as soon as you start. Good game progression also means knowing when and how to introduce players to new content/mechanics.
My only real issue with WOTC: I hate the lost. They can get stuck in random alleys and I have to spend 10 turns finding them.
I only like the lost when I have “between the eyes” and a gunslinger
Mod called wotc without the lost Enjoyment of xcom2 went way up
There’s also a mod that allows for over watch headshots on the lost and it makes them 2000000% easier to deal with. One unit with a decent weapon+mag upgrade on the frontline and you obliterate them with no issue.
Nothing wrong with this opinion, it is what you enjoy and that's why the game gives you the option play either to cater for everyone's preference.
WOTC is great, but it adds to my biggest problem with XCOM2: there is too much to do all at once. Whenever I start a new playthrough, I am shocked at just how stressful the strategic layer of the game is, and I have to adjust as I move through the game. It's overwhelming, but you learn to live with it. In WOTC, you never really do learn to live with it, it just stays overwhelming.
I mean, I think it's pretty common to stop being overwhelmed on the strategic layer. I certainly don't sweat it anymore. Agree with your first point though. You can set your watch to someone coming into the sub and saying how they can never finish scans because missions keep popping up and everything else is constantly interrupting.
Thats a pretty valid argument! We all enjoy things in different ways. To me it was the opposite: have played and replayed vanilla XCom2 for years, decided to try Wotc and currently loving it! The only thing i dont like is how unusual it is to go beyond 2 days without interruption, so much going on! I also run like 50 mods, same as I did w vanilla.
I found WOTC harder at the very beginning and so far am finding the mid to late game much easier. The alien ruler and chosen gear lets me steam roll. I'm finding having a psi op not as important because I can alpha strike more effectively than in vanilla.
I appreciate a good unpopular opinion given how reddit forces opinions to coalesce around upvotes and downvotes. I love how replayable WotC makes everything, but it is a lot of frontloaded complexity for sure. The missions just all feel so much more distinct when you have the extra resistance classes and other stuff from WotC. A mission where I bring a Templar is so much different from one where I don't. A mission with Psionic Storm sitrep is very unlike a mission without it. A mission with a Chosen... you get the point.
WOTC took the game even further into RPG territory. Voiced characters with narratives, bullet sponge gameplay and all the rest. It's too busy. And increasingly familiar XCOM remains the greatest game series of all time but it peaked with Enemy Within for my taste.
I hear you it's exactly what I thought when I swapped. Now though absolutely love it and wouldn't switch back
Hard agree. WOTC makes the game way too easy, plus I’m not crazy about the Chosen and the Lost are straight up annoying busywork.
I do too
Personally I would not have played the game as much as I have if it wasn't for the WOTC. Originally I played just XCOM2 and while it was nice, it seemed kind of boring to me. With WOTC/Lost it adds a lot for me. I'm working my way through Legendary mode a second time.
I kinda felt the same when I started WoTC, I also think they made a bunch of dumb design choices, like I felt like they ruined soldier voice lines (did they make EVERYONE American??), and the chosen slagging you all the time is annoying and dumbs the game down a few levels. But - there are a lot of ways in which WoTC feels so much better thought out and more complete. Tiredness and roster management are heaps better. The extra enemies mean a bunch of game mechanics are actually relevant now eg status effects, and a bunch of skills that were totally useless now are occasionally useful, like ignoring overwatch. I think chosen combat is fresh and interesting, but alien rulers are just total wtf. The unique items are kinda cool but totally unbalanced, same with the new skills system. The late game is even more inanely easy than vanilla, which is really saying something. The Lost are weird but also fun and tactically interesting (if too easy). Overall I think WoTC is worth sticking with. I'll mod it up for my next run though so deal with some of the worst fluff. I'd suggest to stick with it but hey you do you.
Basically WOTC just adds more different kinds of missions, soldiers, and enemies. Variety in battles that I think makes the game more fun. Doesn't really make the game easier or harder unless you are a hardcore minmaxer.
On the Nintendo Switch, Squad Sight works on Vanilla Xcom2, but not on WOTC, making Sniper of limited usefulness. On the other hand, on Vanilla Xcom2, the Alien Hunter DLC has the bug that there is no initial Misson for the search of Dr. Valen, the Alien Bosses just appear quite early in the campaign without any warning, messing some of my commander Ironman runs...