Seriously need help with Detention Centers.

[Apollysis]

I just started playing normal endless and Detention Centers are near impossible for me. The moment I take out the warden everyone comes to my location. An example of what happens to me is this one game where I found it quickly enough, only the warden inside. No one knocked out or patrollin although one door was unexplored. The moment I knock out the Warden though two guys just come out of the door I had not looked through which happened to be across from the prison door and I have no place to hide. Stuff like this happens all the time. I knock out whoever is guarding the prisoner, 1 or 2 people depending on the center and IMMEDIATELY other people just run into the room I am in and either catch me with no cover or I have cover but I have no way of taking it out with my melee on cooldown. What the heck am I supposed to do? I beat them occasionally but it is more due to luck than skill. In my above example if I had looked in that hall and take those guys out, regardless by the time my melee went off of cooldown they would have been up, or I would have had to keep them pinned until it came off cooldown go down to the prison then melee those guys and hope I could get the operative out before everyone woke up.

[ShadowSimmons]

It sounds like your having trouble with the game in general not just prisoner rescue missions. I don't think there are any game mechanics that tell the guards to zero in on your positions once the prisoner has been rescued. Not in my limited experience anyways. 

 

Almost all guards have a patrol route of point A to B and B to A. This means when you watch a room for 1 turn you will either see the guard in the room or see him enter the next turn. If I enter I room I haven't watched I make sure I'm in decent cover in case some guard comes strolling in. If I enter an unwatched room with no cover then my agent better have a pistol or dart gun. 

 

If you have guards 'running' in to the room, not walking, then you have alerted them to your presence somehow. They either heard you running or a guard/camera has spotted you. 

 

The person you call the warden is called the Captain. This is how I deal with him. Before I enter a room I am one space to the right or left of the door. Open the door. If a red box appears at the door then a guard (or 2) is coming to investigate but they are not alerted yet. Peak in to see the situation. Lets assume we have found the detention room and 2 guards are on their way. Close the door. Put an agent on either side of the door and put them in melee overwatch. The first guard usually makes it through the door in the first turn. Now he's unconscious. Close the door again. Next turn the Captain strolls through. Now I'll drag the body over the body of the other guard. Now I have one agent pinning down 2 guards. I use the double pin method for a couple turns to give my slow prisoner a head start. 

 

Lets say you open the door, get the red box, peak and now know you cannot deal with what is coming (too many guards/armour level). Hopefully you have left yourself enough action points to get to cover. The guards will only come as far as the red box, look both directions and say 'Ah must of been nothing' and go back to where they started usually staying looking the other way now. 

 

I'm sure some of this stuff you already knew about but I'm not sure what is causing you to have a high failure rate. There are other tricks you can use too, too many to list here but try using Cloak, or Ping as well. 

 

If you continue to have trouble we will continue to help. Good luck operator. 

[Rafti]

Hi,

 

Yep, if you KO that dude, guards will come looking for you. So try to not KO him.

Luckily he his one of the dumbest guards  and as far as I have seen he will just stay stationary on the tile with the "Question Mark" when he notices you.

 

So you can just let him notice you, run into cover, and leave him be.

 

I'd like if someone could confirm what I'm saying but that has been my experience so far.

 

Good luck !

[ShadowSimmons]

The Captain stays stationary but he watches the door (in detention centre) so he must be dealt with. If you knock him out without letting your presence known (as explained above), then no guards will come looking. This is my experience. Are you sure about that Rafti?

 

edit - I would like to debunk what your saying as that has been my experience so far

 

edit #2 - If he has a question mark above his head he WILL come looking for you (the red square) unless there is a laser/infrared door blocking him.

[Rafti]

Yeah, I might not have been totally understandable about that, so here's my strategy with these rooms when I'm only facing the captain (you have to adapt if facing extra guards)

 

1/ Before entering, wait next to the door in order to have full AP on your agent next turn.

 

2/ Enter the room, you will get noticed by the captain so go for a hidden position. There are 2 good hidden positions, either around the two glass items in the middle of the room (that offers excellent cover btw), or by staying close to the walls and going to the direction of the command that opens the cells.

 

3/ Doing so, the Captain should walk right past you, and he will stay stationary on the last tile he noticed you. He won't even turn back. And if you managed it well, for example by hiding on those glass items, he will be almost facing a wall for the remainder of the mission.

 

4/ Well, you can safelly escape from this room. And has long as you don't KO the captain no one should come looking for you.

 

But yeah if anyone has better strategies to deal with this setup feel free to share !

[Apollysis]

The moment you knock the Captain out they will come after you. Not sure if maybe you have been lucky Shadow. And I do not have a problem with the game itself. I have beaten story mode in normal. In my example there was JUST the Captain. I knocked him out, undetected and surrounding guards were instantly alerted to it. This has been my experience again and again. Anytime the captain is knocked out any guards within a certain area are alerted and will come after you. Thanks for the advice Rafi I will definitely try that out. Odd thing is that I NEVER had the problem when I did story then again that was before the update so maybe in the update when they made normal harder they added that behavior?

[Yarrr]

Yeah. I do believe this is new for the update. Surprised me as well.

[the truthseeker]

Just hide and do not knock him out if you cannot handle the incoming guards as rafti has noted.

 

Or knock him out in a strategic position or drag him elsewhere, then hide. Eventually, the guards will patrol/hunt  in a certain area or you could have moved him to where you want them to look while hiding, then go around them and rescue the prisoner. Even having one of your agents run to attract attention is a possible option of movement/dragging (but not recommended unless you understand how running makes you noticed and how not to be spotted when doing so.) It's anything but easy, but it is doable if you simply don't go in all KO blazing with no plan.  

 

Again, people, if you KO the captain, they WILL now all go to investigate. 

[ShadowSimmons]

My apologies for incorrect information. 4 people here say the Captain being knocked out will cause others to investigate. I have not seen this with my own eyes but this number of people are very unlikely to be wrong. Perhaps this is new to the new build. 

 

Then I suggest following the others advice. Use distracting tactics. Cause him to investigate something. 

 

And here I thought I was being all smart and helpful. 

[Tarean]

It would be neat if you could EMP/hack/steal the radio so other guards don't come after you. Or if you could place the radio somewhere/drag the body and the guards would zero in there.

[yossarian]

Yeah, this was a nasty surprise for me since the update, but you can avoid knocking him out pretty easily.

[ShadowSimmons]

The guards that appear on knocking the Captain out, are they existing guards on the map that move towards you? Do they spawn and if so is it in their normal elevator spawns? I just thought there are like 4 or 5 elevators on some levels. If these are super advanced companies from the future they sure don't know anything about saving money on building design. 

[the truthseeker]

The guards that appear on knocking the Captain out, are they existing guards on the map that move towards you? Do they spawn and if so is it in their normal elevator spawns? I just thought there are like 4 or 5 elevators on some levels. If these are super advanced companies from the future they sure don't know anything about saving money on building design. 

Existing guards until, Alarm level 3

And it's an alternate 60's universe, not from the future

[Syvan]

Here's what I do. I try not to knock anyone out if I can avoid it and Captains are incredibly easy to avoid tazing. I make sure the captain is the only guard watching the door to the cells, then I open and close the door. This will get him to come to the door. Then move your agent to a spot where they won't be spotted when the guard investigates the area. Most stationary guards will then return to their previous position after the dont find anything, but captains will stay put, looking in the same direction.

On the next turn, you want to move into the edge of their vision again, but this time near a wall, so that they investigate and stay facing a wall, just make sure to have another safe hiding spot. Cover will extend an invisible line extending straight from the edge of any barrier you hide behind.

It takes a few turns, but if you have the time, the captain will then continue to stare in a wrong direction, and shouldn't be an issue for any reason if you position him correctly.

[HolyDeath]

It sounds like an exploit to me. The captain should return to his post after investigating.

[Syvan]

Well stationary guard mechanics are strange, and haven't been fixed, so I assume they are intended. I have done this multiple times on at least the most recent build, and the captains always remain fixed at the point of investigation. You can use it to lead them wherever you like. Normal stationary guards can be convinced to stare at a wall, so I assume this is an AI variant to give the strategy a bit of variety.

[Yarrr]

Or it's just early beta and they're working on other things right now. I highly expect them to be smarter in the future.

The guards that is

[Sunswords]

Just sharing something I tested today, Rafti is right that the Captain does not return to his post.

 

In fact, he doesn't even bother turning around. Interestingly, this behaviour extends to all stationary guards that are distracted from their post (with a little twist) - stationary guards return to their post, but face the wrong direction (which is quite funny, maybe they like looking at the wall / room corner), I've noticed this a few times, needs more testing.

 

So about the strategy to handle the captain, your best bet for now is obviously not to knock him out. You can either:

 

1. Use Ping (My preferred solution)

 

- Peek into the room

- Ping the space in between the two gated prison cells that is visible (the captain always stands in the same place and the radius of ping is just right)

- Watch him sandwich himself between the cells and go derp for the rest of the mission

 

2. Lure the Captain 2 Rooms Away

 

This doesn't always work, it depends on map layout and coordination of 2 agents, or Deckard with cloak.

 

- Open the door to the cell block, prompting him to investigate.

- Once he has stepped out and his field of vision is in the new room (he must have sight of another door)

- Use a cloaked deckard to open that door or another agent behind it, prompting him to move another room away.

- Hopefully you don't need to use that doorway, but it'll buy you a few turns to escape at least

 

The reason being is that he blocks the exit to the prison cell.

[Palpetinus]

Everyone is posting those awesome tactics.
All I can say is, I just did whatever came to mind and it usually worked!

 

I always try to lure him away with the edge of his vision and then sneak past silently, there's not much to it. After all he's just another guard, he only happens to look fancier and shouldn't be tazed.