Long War Studios, the folks behind the rather amazing "Long War" mod for XCOM: Enemy Unknown, have returned once again to lend their expertise to XCOM 2.

This time around they're bringing in two mods at the same time, one that adds a brand new tier of laser weaponry to equip your soldiers with, and another that brings forth more than 70 new and reworked abilities that can be assigned to your soldiers, gear, and even the aliens themselves. As before, these mods are completely free and can be downloaded from the Steam Workshop along with the rest of the Long War Studio's repertoire.

Here's a brief rundown on what to expect from the two mods:

The "Laser Pack" mod adds a new laser tier of XCOM weaponry, which includes a new variant for the assault rifle, shotgun, sniper rifle, cannon, pistol, SMG, and all of the attachments that come with them. Sadly, it doesn't appear that there are any lightsabers you can equip as melee weapons, a real shame if you ask me.

All of the new weapons come with their own unique models, textures, particle effects and sounds, pretty much everything you would expect to see from a proper weapon tier. As far as their gameplay effect goes, the laser weapons currently exist between the magnetic and beam tiers, so they should offer a bit of an interesting dynamic when it comes to research and weapon upgrading.

The "Perk Pack" mod brings with it more than 70 new and reworked abilities that can be assigned to soldiers and gear. In order to support this massive amount of new abilities the four base classes have been split into seven, with the new ones being the assault, gunner, shinobi, and potentially a class of your own as well.

With each promotion you will be able to choose from three perks instead of the standard two, and if that wasn't enough, there's ten new items to contend with, each one granting a unique ability. I haven't played around with the mod just yet, so I can't comment on its balance repercussions, but this is some pretty damn exciting stuff when it comes to extending XCOM 2's lifespan, as if it needed to devour more of one's time.