Hello. A new Hardmode enjoyer here. Would like leave some feedback.
I`m playing latest Version 0.99.9.
First of all, I`d like to thank Hellrazor for this extremely painful but incredibly fun and enjoyable experience.
Thanks your feedback and for the praise. I hope you will enjoy the mod until the end, if you get that far.
I`m have been playing this game since release in 1994. Had a classic transformation from save scum to Ironman.
But I`ve never been a super hard core player who knows every ins and outs of the game.
Very long time ago I found original UFO to be very easy.
And switched mostly to TftD since OpenXcom made playing that game a much more reliable experience.
However, some design decisions of TftD always made experience significantly less enjoyable.
I`m of course talking about two staged terror and base mission.
Well i played TFTD myself in the past, but the two stage terror missions and the two stage base missions, were a turn off for me.
I really disliked several of the design decisions in TFTD also.
Once i discovered OpenXcom, i started modding and Hardmode Expansion was being born in 2014 (if i recall correctly).
It basically is my own imagination of UFO Defense, different but still totally in the sense of gameplay vanilla mechanics.
I think that original Xcom almost nailed pacing part of the game from very beginning.
And right now I see Hardmode as a perfect combination of two games.
Much more transparent and easy to follow pacing, and a real challenge difficulty wise.
In my opinion the original Xcom could have needed some more time with playtesters, to iron out some stuff.
ResearchTree and Economy mainly, this was one of the main reasons for this mod.
I`m having my first play through (watched some let`s plays of the mod that sold me on the idea. Thank you Loonsloon), I just transitioned to May. Got my first live alien and working on dataslate.
Here is some feedback and questions based om my limited experience:
Ohh wait until you get to the later months and nasty enemies will show up.
I advice to keep distance from red colored Mutons
1) New research tree is amazing. Really like the idea of alloy rounds to make transition to Lasers much longer and rewarding.
Thank you, you will need a lot alive ranked aliens to get to higher tech. Hope you do not mind.
2) However, I find new shotguns to be slightly over tuned compared to other weapons. And super over tuned compared to Rifles.
For example, first though on new Grenade Launcher was – “OP as hell”.
But very soon, I understood that terrain made them very balanced. Plenty of obstacles.
I presume a deliberate design of some new UFOs that provide addition cover.
Let alone almost zero use in closed environments like bases.
Shotguns on the other hand, seem to have zero down sides. First of all, Shotgun snap shot is mathematically over five times better over rifle.
They both have same TU cost of 25%. Same accuracy of 60% but rifle shoots only one round and shotgun shoots five of them.
In comparison, Rifle auto shot is just a joke. Three shots with lower accuracy and higher TU cost.
And on top of that, add higher damage of individual round of a shotgun. 46 against 40.
I feel like rifles need a boost in accuracy and TU cost to be justified.
And no, I don`t think that higher values for aimed shot compensate. Snipers are better and we always have second support trooper for CQB.
Besides, you only need two snipers at most. Maybe two grenade launchers (if terrain allows it), rest is just shotguns.
The grenade launcher and the modified small launcher are especially powerful, when the terrain is good.
And they are nearly totaly useless indoors, due to the arking shot.
Shotguns, yes go down the road of overestimation of them and it will be your downfall.
Shotguns only have a effective Range of 20 tiles, of course you can forcefire but in my eyes it not really worth.
Id rather take some Aimed Rifle Shot or Snaps shots, when the enemy is more then 16 tiles away.
If find the random bullet spread on distance with shotguns just to dangerous for my own units.
I occasionally use Scatter Lasers to clear obstacles in midrange, but Shotguns class weapons are designed for a fighting distance of 1 - 16 tiles distance.
For high hit point enemies consider distance 1 - 8 tiles to deliver massive damage, play shotgunners similar then in NuCom (Thats the idea, with Advanced Movement Methods, you can run and strafe!).
Also Conventional Shotguns with Alloy Rounds are a pretty safe way to kill Chrysalids up close, they can oneshot them (Crit!!).
Cyberdiscs can also be killed with them, but Alloy AP Heavy Canon can do that better from distance.
Rifles (and of course Sniper Rifles) deal safely with long distance low HP units, Shotguns deal safely with short distance high HP units.
And there are some really nasty high HP units. Please let me know of your first encounter with Muton Berserkers
I enjoy listening to the pain they provide to player units.
3) Are melee weapons just fun service? For now, I see zero use for them. Maybe later versions will change my mind.
Melee weapons are designed to deliver massive damage in CQC, all melee weapons apply the units strength towards the damage.
A soldier with 70 strength and a plasma sword can deal 0 - 340 damage. If attacking from behind he will not trigger reactionfire.
I may change the usage TU of melee weapons in the future, currently its a fixed 20 TU per usage, i think percentage wise would be better.
4) In my play through if found remarkably few UFOs. It`s may. I saw only 24. Most of them are very small that often outrun my Interceptors.
And significant chunk had been large sectiod ships.
I have three radar bases in regions that game claimed to have alien activity.
But after construction, two of my bases had zero contact. I know of the second base. But it`s a sectiod base.
Basically invulnerable at this point. Found third one after region had signed a pact with aliens and luckily it was mixed Floater/Sectoid base.
In normal game this good for you. But here, where main income is missions, that is a significant problem.
I feel like things will start to fall apart by the end of the month.
What`s even stranger, is that I watch Loonsloon`s play through, and he had been doing better than me in terms of dealing with aliens, and yet, he sees plenty of UFOs.
Get more Rader bases and check your graphs for activity. You can also stack large radars on bases.
It also depends on how many UFO's you shot down, i avoid shooting down UFO's and try to catch them when being landed. (No retaliation)
Usually 3 is enough on one base to nearly detect any UFO which comes in range. You get more discovery checks.
If you know were a alien base is, make sure you build a base of your own nearby, place a combat team there and milk supply ships for money.
5) Psi…. Oh boy, where to begin with that. This part of the game had always been most broken and frustrating.
Second month – full Sectoid base. Zero chances of successful assault.
Also, that makes all large UFOs I find near that base pure Sectoids. Making them a low chance gamble for an Ironman play through.
Perhaps, we could tune game logic a little bit. So that pure Sectiod crews appear a little further down the road?
Or, I`d make Sectoid Psi abilities slightly weaker. Like increase TUs to make them use it slightly less often.
That will give us a proper fighting chance and we could meet Ethereals prepared.
A hint:
Get some Personal Armor or Power Suits, once you have Pistols with Alloy Ammo and normal HE grenades are all you need to handle full sectoids supply ships.
Bring a big team, a few guys will go nuts, but they can't hurt themselves or others. Its the perfect opportunity to capture a sectoid leader for psionics.
6) On top of that, I`d make our solders unable to use attacking Psi abilities. And made Psi-Amp in to a purely defensive mechanism. Not impenetrable shield. But additional protection for Psi attacks.
You can't MC Ethereals anymore. What i was thinking is making Psi-Amps use up stamina with each attack.
Your soldiers will be basically safe from PSI attacks with Psi Str 80+, when being close up to Ethereals you want Psi Str 90+.
In Harmode Expansion v1.0 lategame enemies will be more resistant to Mind Control, especially over long distance.
Your Psi Soldier will have to move up, to reliably control enemies. At least thats my idea, with this change.
7) Some minor terrain issues. Particularly I had some very frustrating jungle/pyramid layouts that made large UFO site frustrating as hell. Very narrow paths.
Extreme amount of vegetation. And more importantly, when I tried to clear path, most of the vegetation turned out to be immune do explosives and incendiary damage.
Noted, I have to recheck the pyramid and the some of the jungle terrain destructability.
But again. Thank you very much for this mode. It was super fun. Hoping it will improve over time and more people will hear about it.
Thank you for your feedback. I hope you enjoy playing the mod.
