It shouldn't be, unless you're playing on a high difficulty. Did you check what the different difficulty settings do?

Originally posted by Echo:

It shouldn't be, unless you're playing on a high difficulty. Did you check what the different difficulty settings do?

it was on normal difficulty, changing it to story mode didnt change anything until i restarted the game. weird bug it seems

As far as I remember (I don't have the game currently installed), only Cruel difficulty makes all enemies Elite at the minimum. On Normal you should have mostly regulars.

Changing the difficulty before the mission starts should also take effect without having to restart the game. If it didn't, then it would be a bug, or maybe a corrupted installation.

You might've also accidentally enabled challenge mode when starting the mission. It does make the enemies a lot stronger even on the lower difficulties.

You can change it at the top of the mission list once you have a mission selected.

That map is pretty hard, just because Jason is so powerful. I often skip it when replaying the game because I'm a wuss.

On normal they shouldn't ALL be elite... from what I remember there's 3 packs of enemies; each with 1 elite (usually a biker) and then Jason's group that has Jason as the "boss"... and yes; if you get caught out in the beginning you CAN get one-shot (or 2-shot) as Albus but the VHPD SHOULD be more bulky so use them to explore. Don't make them tank Jason though; he hits like a truck AND has a pushback move which can result in him stunlocking your guys....

Jason's group will ALWAYS be in the middle though so they can easily be setup for a flanking ambush. Knowing that you can clear out the other 3 groups first but be carefull they don't get a chance to alert Jason's group because if they do Jason will immediately rally the entire map and you can get easily overrun.

My tactic is usually to make a run towards the NE; stopping at the stairs to regain AP then doing a single move with a VHPD to see if there's a group in the NE corner and if there are then take them out. Then circle around from NE-corner via the street to the NW (usually there's a group there too) and take them out in the same way. Then finally split your squad and bring half of them back to the S-stairs and engage from there... usually they will try and hide-out behind the central pillar which is pretty easy to engage from the E corner where you took out the groups.... Jason is a coward so if you put at least some damage on him he'll try to retreat to the W corner to both heal and rally that group which will take him long enough to wipe out the group with the Telemancer. Keep this behaviour in mind too; enemies have very distinct personalities that govern their Ai and can be easily exploited once you know but also keep in mind all enemies can only heal ONCE via a potion and most early enemies will heal if brought <50% hp.

On normal difficulty Jason killed both Albus and Sion with a single charging bull attack. I was like, "dang..." but I still cleaned up with the VHPD, though it took a while. This game is full of surprises.

So I just played this mission for the first time. I tried doing what folks suggested and skirting the outside to kill enemy groups.. yeah that doesn't work. One group was killable... the next group you attack summons Jason and all of his lackeys, and I ended up in a huge mess. BUT... we pulled it off. The VCPD were key.... they have high defense, heal potions, and can tank quite well. Plus they put out good damage. But you have to try and keep Albus and Sion safe from Jason because he will lay them out in two hits, and he has a very high action speed.
Sion and one VCPD dropped, but Albus and the other two were able to pull it off.
Oh and Jason heals multiple times, not just once. He healed at least 2 times in my battle, so I think he just carries 2 heal potions like the VCPD.

That said... now that I beat that mission... I'm a bit confused what to do next? That mission was listed as "Normal" difficulty, but the only other missions on my board are "Hard" and "Very Hard" unless I just want to repeat this one I guess? I'm a bit confused.

Are new "Normal" difficulty missions supposed to populate?

Most of the early missions the VHPD disposable police are very useful. Once your character has better masteries and you understand how the game works then you can juts send them off to bait enemies or just tell them to go home.

Also the difficulty they suggest for missions are not realy accurate. The real difficulty is your own setting.

Originally posted by sillybrian:

So I just played this mission for the first time. I tried doing what folks suggested and skirting the outside to kill enemy groups.. yeah that doesn't work. One group was killable... the next group you attack summons Jason and all of his lackeys, and I ended up in a huge mess. BUT... we pulled it off. The VCPD were key.... they have high defense, heal potions, and can tank quite well. Plus they put out good damage. But you have to try and keep Albus and Sion safe from Jason because he will lay them out in two hits, and he has a very high action speed.
Sion and one VCPD dropped, but Albus and the other two were able to pull it off.
Oh and Jason heals multiple times, not just once. He healed at least 2 times in my battle, so I think he just carries 2 heal potions like the VCPD.

That said... now that I beat that mission... I'm a bit confused what to do next? That mission was listed as "Normal" difficulty, but the only other missions on my board are "Hard" and "Very Hard" unless I just want to repeat this one I guess? I'm a bit confused.

Are new "Normal" difficulty missions supposed to populate?

Sorry to hear that you had trouble with Jason... Curious though... there's 5 spawnpoints for the other groups of enemies... did you happen to have the NE, North-East Central and North (so clockwise from where you start the 3,4&5 locations) spawn because I'll agree if you get those 3 spawns the mission gets a lot harder for your first actual mission...
Also; you might not be aware of this but read your attack options carefully... attacks with the "drop" tag bypass cover most of the time so Sion's lightning drop is ideal to take out people who're bunkered in behind cover and his chain lightning attack shouldn't be used if your enemy isn't clustered... VHPD gunners have a delay attack which adds 35TU's to an enemy if they hit with it BUT their single shot usually deals more damage... likewise the melee VHPD have an attack that CAN add shock to enemies but you usually just want to have them harras gunners with single attacks because that shock hardly ever goes off, and the damage versus TU expenditure just isn't worth it...but they DO have lightning reflexes so you can use them to break enemy overwatch because the enemy will try to shoot them from overwatch and miss due to them having Lightning Reflexes
Treat this game more like you would Classic XCOM... it's not a race to be first as much as delaying enemies so they act AFTER you (remember the delay effect has diminishing returns). Do whatever you can to NOT get flanked yourself... this game revolves around map control a whole lot in the beginning
Also keep in mind the environment is interactive... goons who get pushed into objects (or eachother) get stunned and skip their next turn... people standing in water take more lightning damage... Irene is inherently immune to fire etc etc

As for missions and to echo what Nameless said; difficulty-LABELING of missions is a bit tricky in this game with them usually being listed as Hard by default but considder them hard++ for the early game (and each time you start one of the DLC's... the clowns are a big step up again for example and so are the detrons once you first start encountering them)... so, again echoing Nameless, set your own difficulty via the options menu but you still have to expect some rough moments... first time route 18 to escort the trucker can become a serious hassle if you don't know what's coming for example; even on easy setting... and chapter fights will be hard no matter what... it's usually just the first time though.

I usually start with some gearing missions (you can replay jason's mission to grind for masteries for example) otherwise storymissions are labeled with a yellow "book" icon before the name of the mission and most other missions are red (combat missions) or blue (Interaction mission; which can have combat mind you but usually have a gimmick going on like finding yasha's in a yunkyard)

Also: protip without spoiling too much.... if your companions ask for a day off or Albus suggests a day off.... get your sniz-together.. because "having a day off" must be the greatest meme in this game xD

I just finished that mission, playing on hard, perfect rating. I stayed near the perimeter, avoiding the center area, trying my best not to aggro too many enemies, but near the end I had 12+ units attacking me. What saved me this mission is that I retreated and used HP potions to heal up whenever needed. Also, that I got overcharge with Sion and was able to finish off Jason with Lightning Storm before he killed Sion.

Then after that, I quickly finished off the enemies that dealt lots of damage (the one inflicting bruise, and the pyro). Then I picked off a bunch of weaklings with Albus, while the others went around and collected the treasure chests.

There was a moment where I got frustrated and almost gave up: When I retreated with Sion to heal, Jason followed him (!), plus the constant barrage of enemy attacks to everyone else. But after taking out Jason I slowly gained control of the battlefield, and was glad I did not restart the mission.