Research Mission

Research missions are one of the most common mission types the alien side will be running for all of the early game. Research missions are the aliens' way of gaining intelligence about a certain region, and they contribute to the efficiency of any other mission type run in that area. For example, if you have a high research rating in Europe, any abduction, harvest, or other type of mission carried out there will provide more resources than if you had a low research score.

The way to boost your intelligence level in a region is as simple as running additional research missions. You can find out what you intelligence level in an area is by selecting the research mission for one of your UFOs. After being selected, you will see percentages listed over each region which represent your research value in that area. The higher the percentage value, the more efficient any missions run there will be.

The most effective ship type for carrying out research missions are the various scout type UFOs. Small scouts will do the vast majority of researching in the early game as they are not good at anything else. The later scouts ships (Medium and Large) are more versatile and can carry out most mission types with reasonable efficiency. However, in addition to being able to conduct mission types such as Harvest or Abduction, the later scout ships also have massive boosts to their research efficiency.