XCOM line of sight issues

[KBan]

Currently loving XCOM (finding it a real challenge which is awesome for me as few games nowadays kick your ass quite like this one, I'm on my 3rd play-through attempt already!).

While I have some issues with the game (bouts of bad luck, near impossible to recover from a bad mission etc), something that infuriates me is line of sight, especially when it comes to the sniper. Sometimes I'll send him back into a retreat position thinking that he has line of sight through some cars/trees, only to discover I got it ever so slightly wrong. Same with grappling, sometimes I get it just one square askew!! Barring a 1st person view option does anybody know of any mods that fix this?

Also, is anybody else finding this game as hard as me? It's beating me down!! I just can't stand to lose my best guys, it's impossible to level new ones when every freakin' enemy is a muton/cyberdisk!! (just got near wiped by an ambush group of 5 mutons that rushed me when I was trying to level 2 rookies...)

 

[Kalisnoir]

Haven't played it in months but I don't recall having much problem with my sniper, have you got the squad sight thing?

As far as difficulty, yeah, it starts to get real difficult, and then countries start dropping out and it all starts going **** up. Wasn't till my 4th play through I started to get to grips with it better, still started getting my arse handed to me though!

 

[Karnor00]

Mostly I try to keep my snipers in open ground as much as possible, but far enough away from the enemy that they can't be seen. That way i maximise my chance of being able to snipe an enemy.

Mostly I found that the game is a matter of moving forward nice and slowly. Always ensure before you move someone that the rest of your squad is ready to open fire on any enemies you may see. Typically I don't move more than one or two people per turn. Don't be afraid of firing even with a relatively low chance to hit (20%) - with your whole squad ready to fire that's plenty good enough to almost guarantee a kill. Shotguns are hopeless (give the assault troopers regular guns). Snipers are massively overpowered.

Terror missions are the toughest, but don't try and save everyone. Just saving half the people will still get you a decent rating.

Otherwise, get satellites up as fast as you can afford - these help to maximise your income and reduce the chance of terror missions in satellite covered countries.