Psi Armor (armor)

Psi Armor is an advanced body armor in XCOM: Enemy Unknown. This armor can only be equipped by soldiers with Psionic Abilities.

In-Game Description

“	Our most powerful armored suit, this equipment serves to amplify the wearer's psionic abilities through a system modeled after the alien's own cybernetic implants. However, it should be noted, this armor can only be equipped by a soldier found to have Psionic abilities.	”
– Engineering description, XCOM: Enemy Unknown

Production Specifications

Prerequisites: Psi Armor (Research)
Production Time: Immediate
Engineers: 30

Production Cost:

• §400
• 20 Alloys
• 40 Elerium

Tactical Info

“	▪	Health Bonus: 6	”
	▪	Medium armor
	▪	Increases wearer's Will by 30 for psi attacks and defense
– Tactical Info, XCOM: Enemy Unknown

Despite the description, Psi Armor increases the wearer's Will by 20. In XCOM: Enemy Within the tactical info has been corrected.

Notes

• Although not stated, Psi Armor also confers +10 Defense and +2 movement.
• Does not protect against fire, poison, or strangulation.
  • Psi Armor can be used in conjunction with a Mind Shield for strangulation immunity, or a Respirator Implant ^EW for immunity to both poison and strangulation.
• Combining this armor's Will bonus with a Mind Shield and leveling up with the Iron Will OTS upgrade may grant psionic soldiers sufficient Will to take on Ethereals in mental battles. With a turn of preparation, Psi Inspiration and Combat Drugs can further increase the odds of psionically defeating an Ethereal's mental defenses.
• The Volunteer must wear this armor to activate the Gollop Chamber, and during the ensuing final mission.

Pros and Cons

Class-based differentiation collected into one place.

Before going into the details as with the other armor choices, some ideas might need to be clarified. Psi warfare location, the range where a squad decides it is worth initiating a battle of the Psi Abilities, and the situation it is at compared to the squad members' contact range (and nature) is a factor to discern. The four possible (psionic-sensitive) classes and their distance from a presumed enemy frontal assault is:

1. Assault - Having a tendency to try to close the distance between its point blank oriented weapon and its targets to 0 tiles.
2. Heavy - Having less ranged penalty but still needing close proximity to hit more times.
3. Support - Having the normal medium range rifle, it still comes under hostile fire but fires from a possible less dangerous distance.
4. Sniper - The one that is always way back behind the line of fire, but needs special training and equipment to participate in front-line warfare.

Note that this order is purely theoretical, but fully justifiable at the same time.

By clarifying their weapon ranges in such order, we now get the possible epicenters where the most prominent Psi attacks can be initiated. Psi Armor as such, making psi attacks amplified, ultimately becomes the armor of the primary Psionic Soldier. Therefore by utilizing its attributes, it is natural that our selected psi warfare initiation distance becomes one with the Psi Armor user making all other participants considered secondary.

Additionally, class, contact range, and personal preference will all determine in turn, which Psionic Powers to select for each soldier. The superior Will amplification of the Psi Armor should be used by troops who utilize offensive psionic abilities, because those which are defensive do only depend on the users range, not the will of any target, thereby making Psi Armor useless for them.

Now that we are in possession of such information, we can analyze the roles of each class when dealing with these special objectives.

Assault Soldier

• CON - As the primary psi initiator, might be too far in the front lines to effectively defend soldiers in the back if they happen to be ambushed.
• CON - Classified as Medium Armor, does not unleash the full potential of Extra Conditioning.
• CON - The armor protection factor might be found wanting for an Assault soldier.
• PRO - Defense bonus stacks with Tactical Sense.
• PRO - Makes good use of Resilience.
• PRO - May choose to injure someone whom they plan to attack with psionics next round by using Flush, which does reduced damage.

Heavy Soldier

• CON - Defensive psionic abilites should be chosen by the Heavy soldier, because they are in the middle of the Assault-Heavy-Support front-line battle theoretical epicenter, making perfect use of Psi Inspiration and Telekinetic Field. This makes them worthless candidates in this matter. But at least this helps to choose an armor for them other than this, because Telekinetic Field does not reveal a cloaking unit! (Ghost Armor)
• CON - Using psionic powers ends the turn, thus disables the use of other offensive capabilities which all might deal more damage, like Fire Rocket, Shredder Rocket, Grenadier, Bullet Swarm, Holo Targeting, Suppression, Rapid Reaction, Danger Zone, Rocketeer, and Mayhem!
• PRO - The Heavy will not be without any offensive capabilities, because using Mindfray on a Mechtoid activates HEAT Ammo. This also works well without Psi Armor, but if one decides to give it to them after all, it can ensure success with untrained Heavies.
• PRO - The Defense bonus helps the survival of the soldier along with Will to Survive.

Support Soldier

• CON - Compared to other armors, the poison and fire immunities might be missed.
• PRO - Good enough psi warfare center placement both for attacking the front, and defending the back. Perhaps even being able to reach hostiles that tried to ambush a possible laid back Sniper.
• PRO - Choosing a psionic attack instead of a weapon firing is not such a great reduction in damage, because the Support class tends to have the weakest weapon.
• PRO - Can easily choose offensive psionic powers, because defensive ones would make either themselves or Smoke Grenade, Smoke and Mirrors, or Dense Smoke/Combat Drugs redundant.
• PRO - The Sprinter ability can be useful to close up to psi initiation range.
• PRO - When also using a Mind Shield, still front-line enough to capture an Etherial and in the next turn use its Rift against hostiles.

Sniper Soldier

• CON - Too far away back to attack the front lines with psionic attacks, at least for Squadsight builds.
• CON - Also too far away for the Will bonus to reinforce Lead By Example.
• PRO - The Defense bonus increases the soldier's survivability combined with Low Profile.
• PRO - The Will and Mobility bonuses give a Squadsight sniper that's forced to move a means of attack the front lines that isn't their sidearm.

Gallery

Concept Art

Psi Armor greatly enhances the Will of a Psionic.

A male Psionic soldier wearing Psi Armor.

A female Psionic soldier wearing tinted Psi Armor.