Whenever one of your units makes an attack against an enemy, you will likely have a random chance to hit. Aim is the stat that governs how likely you are to hit your shots. Each point of aim equals one percentage point of hit chance.
Increasing your aim is the most consistent way to improve your soldier's lethality in the field. Missing fewer shots means generally fewer inconveniences suffered in the field. Aim can be improved in a variety of ways both on and off the battlefield.
In battle, your chance to hit any shot is Aim - Defense. Calculating the Aim stat and the Defense stat will require taking several modifiers into account.
Boosts to aim[edit | edit source]
Soldier base aim stat[edit | edit source]
Each soldier has a base aim stat. In vanilla, this is determined entirely by their class and rank. In War of the Chosen, soldiers may boost their base aim stat by going on covert actions.
All Rookies have 65 aim
| Rank | Grenadier | Ranger | Sharpshooter | Specialist | Psi Operative |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Squaddie | 67 | 68 | 75 | 68 | 67 |
| Corporal | 69 | 71 | 79 | 71 | 69 |
| Sergeant | 71 | 74 | 82 | 74 | 71 |
| Lieutenant | 72 | 76 | 85 | 76 | 72 |
| Captain | 73 | 78 | 87 | 78 | 73 |
| Major | 74 | 79 | 89 | 79 | 74 |
| Colonel | 75 | 80 | 91 | 80 | 75 |
| Rank | SPARK | Reaper | Skirmisher | Templar |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Squaddie | 68 | 75 | 68 | 68 |
| Corporal | 71 | 79 | 71 | 71 |
| Sergeant | 74 | 82 | 74 | 74 |
| Lieutenant | 76 | 85 | 76 | 76 |
| Captain | 78 | 87 | 78 | 78 |
| Major | 79 | 89 | 79 | 79 |
| Colonel | 80 | 91 | 80 | 80 |
Weapon Range Bonus[edit | edit source]
"Close Range?" ~Central Officer Bradford, 2015
Most XCOM weaponry receives a bonus to their aim as they get closer to the enemy. Furthermore, some weapon types receive penalties to their aim when fighting at an inappropriate range. For example, Shotguns get a bonus to aim against any target within 10 squares and a penalty to their aim against any target beyond 11 squares. As a general rule, alien weaponry does not benefit from weapon range bonuses.
Short Range Weapons include Shotguns, Pistols, Bullpups, Templar Autopistols, and the Arashi
| Range | Weapon Range Bonus |
|---|---|
| 1 | 40 |
| 2 | 35 |
| 3 | 32 |
| 4 | 28 |
| 5 | 23 |
| 6 | 19 |
| 7 | 16 |
| 8 | 12 |
| 9 | 6 |
| 10 | 2 |
| 11 | 0 |
| 12 | -2 * |
| 13 | -4 |
| 14 | -7 |
| 15 | -10 |
| 16 | -12 |
| 17 | -15 |
| 18 | -17 |
| 19 | -18 |
| 20 | -18 |
| 21 | -19 |
| 22 | -19 |
| 23 | -21 |
| 24 | -25 |
| 25 | -30 |
- Note: at exactly 10 tiles away, a magnetic or plasma shotgun will have +3 aim, not +2 aim
Medium Range Weapons include Assault Rifles and Cannons. This is the only weapon category which never receives a penalty to aim due to weapon range. Oddly, they receive noticeably different bonuses depending on what tier of weapon you are using.
| Range | Conventional | Magnetic | Beam |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 20 | 21 | 22 |
| 2 | 19 | 20 | 22 |
| 3 | 17 | 19 | 21 |
| 4 | 16 | 17 | 20 |
| 5 | 13 | 16 | 19 |
| 6 | 11 | 14 | 17 |
| 7 | 9 | 11 | 15 |
| 8 | 7 | 9 | 13 |
| 9 | 5 | 7 | 11 |
| 10 | 4 | 5 | 9 |
| 11 | 3 | 4 | 7 |
| 12 | 2 | 3 | 5 |
| 13 | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| 14 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| 15 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| 16 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| 17 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| 18 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| 19 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
The only Long-Range Weapon is the sniper rifle. It can never receive weapon range bonuses - it can only receive penalties for being too close to its target.
| Range | Weapon Range Bonus |
|---|---|
| 1 | -30 |
| 2 | -27 |
| 3 | -24 |
| 4 | -21 |
| 5 | -18 |
| 6 | -15 |
| 7 | -12 |
| 8 | -9 |
| 9 | -6 |
| 10 | -3 |
| 11 | 0 |
Lastly, the Vektor Rifle has its own set of weapon range tables. It most closely resembles the medium range table.
| Range | Conventional | Magnetic | Beam |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 25 | 26 | 27 |
| 2 | 24 | 25 | 27 |
| 3 | 22 | 24 | 26 |
| 4 | 21 | 22 | 25 |
| 5 | 18 | 21 | 24 |
| 6 | 16 | 19 | 22 |
| 7 | 14 | 16 | 20 |
| 8 | 12 | 14 | 18 |
| 9 | 10 | 12 | 16 |
| 10 | 9 | 10 | 14 |
| 11 | 8 | 9 | 12 |
| 12 | 7 | 8 | 10 |
| 13 | 6 | 7 | 8 |
| 14 | 4 | 6 | 7 |
| 15 | 2 | 4 | 6 |
| 16 | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| 17 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| 18 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| 19 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Good Angle bonus[edit | edit source]
XCOM units may receive a Good Angle bonus when firing on enemies in cover. As your unit gets nearer and nearer to flanking the enemy's cover, the bonus will grow in magnitude. Good Angle bonus caps at half the enemy's cover bonus.
In order to receive a good angle bonus, the following conditions must all be met:
- The target must have cover against your shot
- You must fire from within 11 tiles of your target
- You must be firing from an angle of less than 44 degrees (shooting from perfectly diagonal to your target is exactly a 45 degree shot, a flanking shot would be 0 degrees)
- If the target is in low cover, it must not have additional low cover extending towards your firing position.
Bear in mind that when determining your actual firing position, leaning rules may come into play.
The literal angle of your shot is used to determine the good angle bonus. At 44 degrees, you receive no bonus. At 10 degrees or closer, you receive the maximum bonus to hit, which is half the target's cover bonus. Anywhere in between, and you get a bonus to aim proportional to how close you are to 10 degrees from 44 (determined via linear interpolation).
Penalties to Aim[edit | edit source]
Squadsight[edit | edit source]
Although the squadsight perk allows you to shoot targets beyond your 17-tile vision range (a normally impossible feat), anyone making such a shot will suffer an aim penalty. The aim penalty is 2 points of aim per tile beyond your normal range.
Boosts to Defense[edit | edit source]
A unit's defense stat is subtracted directly from any attacker's hit rate. 1 point of defense reduces the hit rate by 1 percentage point.
Cover[edit | edit source]
By far the most common form of defense boost is cover. As long as a unit stands against cover, they have a defense bonus against all ranged attacks which come from the other side of that cover.
High cover (sometimes referred to as "full cover") provides +40 defense. Low cover (sometimes referred to as "half cover") provides +20 defense.
Whenever an attack comes from an angle that could be prevented by both high cover and low cover, it faces the high cover hit penalty. If an attack hits a unit who is not benefiting from any kind of cover, that unit is "flanked", and the attack has an extra 40 crit.
Aliens may not earn a cover bonus to defense against shots from concealed XCOM operatives. However, if an enemy unit is standing next to something that would provide cover, any shot taken against that target will not get the +40 crit that it would normally earn from a "flanking" shot.
Overwatch shots made against moving targets are always flanking shots and ignore any cover bonuses the target would have had. Overwatch shots made against stationary targets (from the Covering Fire or Threat Assessment abilities) do not ignore cover, and will have their aim penalized according to the enemy's cover.
Some units may not take cover at all, and so cannot earn a boost to defense due to cover. That said, shots taken against these units can never receive the +40 crit that one would normally earn from a "flanking" shot. These units may not take cover, but they also cannot be flanked. The XCOM Spark is the only playable unit with this property. Alien units with this property include the Faceless, ADVENT Turret, ADVENT MEC, Berserker, Archon, ADVENT Heavy MEC, Andromedon Shell form, Chryssalid, Sectopod, and Gatekeeper.
Innate Defense[edit | edit source]
Many enemies simply have defense. Enemy defense stats tend to change frequently with difficulty, so check an enemy's page if you want to see whether or not they have a defense stat. Note that while many enemies with armor also tend to have defense, the two stats are completely independent and distinct. Defense reduces chance to hit, while armor reduces damage taken when you are hit.
Hunker Down[edit | edit source]
The Hunker Down command, when used, will give its user 30 defense. It will also give 50 dodge.
Sources[edit | edit source]
Class aim data found in XCOM 2 configs: XCOM 2\XComGame\Config\DefaultClassData.ini for the vanilla classes, XCOM 2\XComGame\DLC\DLC_3\Config\XComClassData.ini for the SPARK, and XCOM 2\XCom2-WarOfTheChosen\XComGame\Config\DefaultClassData.ini for the resistance heroes
Weapon range data was found in XCOM 2 WotC configs: XCOM 2\XCom2-WarOfTheChosen\XComGame\Config\DefaultGameData_WeaponData.ini. Weapon category (whether a weapon was a close, medium, or long range weapon) was found in WotC source code: XComGame\Classes\X2Item_XpackWeapons.uc
Good angle bonus values found in configs steamapps\common\XCOM 2\XComGame\Config\DefaultGameCore.ini and formula found in source code steamapps\common\XCOM 2 SDK\Development\SrcOrig\XComGame\Classes\X2AbilityToHitCalc_Standardaim