Messages

721

Work In Progress / Re: 'Equal Terms' Mod Discussion.

« on: August 27, 2014, 05:18:27 am »

AWESOME


@Dioxine - no offense taken, I just felt like dropping my two cents thats all, contributing to the pile. And you're right the --Armor thing is a better way to go with it. Im just so used to thinking in terms of multipliers.

The negative: unloading 10 laser shots at a barn wall will make 10 holes in the barn wall, but won't destroy it for easy access.

Even with Overpenetration allowed (ability to shoot through walls), the amount of damage the weapon does should still be applied to the things it hits.

So the laser rifle not only checks to see if it can shoot through the wall, it also hands that wall it's well deserved 60 damage too. Blows holes in walls (maybe) and pierces through them too.

Maybe the damage should be rolled first to figure out if it can do one, or other, or both.


Also the protective quality of everything it has hit should add up against the shot, and possibly reduce the damage caused too. Thats why I said its a fairly hairy issue to code (I smell a FOR loop, maybe a few of them).

And even then the proper way to do it would not just be to add up the Armor values of the things its hit, but to take the biggest and add a percentage of all the others to it. That way something that can shoot through a UFO wall isnt going to be stopped by 3 brick walls. (my suggestion for that just for initial testing is take the highest, add 50% of all of the obstacles encountered and penetrated already to determine if it still has enough juice to punch through the next --- when damage is dealt the damage value is reduced by 75% of the above accrued obstacle strength).

And well, if something is supposed to explode on impact, that negates overpenetration for it.

722

Open Feedback / Re: TFTD Damage or XCom damage?

« on: August 27, 2014, 04:50:18 am »

I posted a thread about this somewhere else, but to clarify . . . the behavior witnessed suggesting that TFTD did damage on a 50-150% basis may just be an assumption.

I found out from someone else that TFTD generates two random numbers, adds them together, then multiplies by the damage value.

That produces a "peak" average curve similar to rolling two standard dice, making the average more reliable, but still not excluding extremes.

Later on I witnessed this on a rare event when one of my (non armored) soldiers was shot by a Sonic Cannon (130 damage) and he survived and took somewhere around 30 damage from it. According to the 50% scheme he should have taken a minimum of 65 before armor.

723

Open Feedback / Re: Aliens throwing grenades for less TUs than humans?

« on: August 27, 2014, 04:41:07 am »

in vanilla Xcom TFTD (which I played the most) I often noticed aliens throwing a grenade then taking a snap shot, and those weapons have higher TU costs . . . and then walk around a little

So they are not getting charged for Priming the grenade, only throwing it.

Maybe they have this little implant in their arm that auto-primes their grenades when they throw them eh? Too bad the xcom researchers never found it or the electronic receiver in their grenades that allowed them to be remotely activated in flight.

>>> reasoning ,the aliens never prime their grenades in advance, otherwise there would have been cases where you shoot one and the grenades he drops explode. Nevar happened in the history of gameplay.

(in other news, one can throw a grenade underwater up to a hundred yards, but in doom flynn taggart can carry every weapon in his arsenal too. thats games man)

724

Open Feedback / Re: Explosion height & Alternate movement methods

« on: August 27, 2014, 04:35:17 am »

Well that makes more sense.

I was starting to think Explosion Height just meant "this is how many vertical layers of the map it affects . . . 1 layer, 2 layers, or 3 layers".

The real deal with toasting a building is . . . for some reason Xcom has problems with Floor Tiles being blasted real easy. Its always had that problem it seems, UFO hull walls may stand up to a bomb but the floors inside wont. (at least thats the way it was in TFTD).

725

Suggestions / Weapons which Launch themselves

« on: August 27, 2014, 04:20:35 am »

Okay so in the xcom clone I was designing, I didnt want a big rocket launcher for the aliens, there was a focus on different-is-better rather than bigger-is-better. But I still wanted to give them a weapon of mass destruction like the Blaster Launcher (because its so dam cool).

So the answer was, they just have big grenades, which automatically launch themselves and guide to target when you toss them. An attached lanyard was used to toss it up in the air, and it would then speed off to the target with its own antigravity motor going up to 150kph, up to 10 km away (just imagine the possibilities).

Haha and then to my surprise in the future sequences on the movie Cloud Atlas one of the characters tosses grenades that act just like it.

So its a Blaster Launcher, minus the launcher.

Which would be made possible by making a weapon utterly disposable and non-reloadable. As in it disappears from your inventory as soon as you fire it or the number of shots is expended from it. Which might also suggest weapons which have an ammunition counter all to themselves (internalCapacity: xx). And possibly an additional boolean to destroyWhenEmpty.

Disposable weapons with an internal capacity would also be great for low manpower hours construction items - disposable laser pistols (welcome to the land of chinese industry). But at least if they get brought back to the base they get reloaded (or possibly not with treatedAsMagazine so that if it has lost any shots at all, it is discarded upon mission end)

Leading to a scenario that if you do fire the last shot in it "this message will self destruct in 30 seconds mr phelps" because you dont want tech just laying around on the ground even if the battery is dead. (though this of course is just flavor text)

726

Suggestions / Re: It makes no sense that alien ships have no outward damage.

« on: August 27, 2014, 03:54:34 am »

I think it's way too much. I'd say 0,2 kg at most. (Unless I'm misunderstanding something.)

Inventory weight of Grenades is 3 pounds.
One pound of explosive and double as much for the casing seems appropriate.

If I recall a typical real-world grenade of the suggested shape of the xcom grenade only weighs near about 1 pound and would have about 0.2Kg of explosive in it. So these grenades are darn-tootin-big like the Mills Bomb and similar defensive grenades from earlier wars (tv trope:they dont build them like they used to).

Another basis for measuring it would be the High Explosive device (110 damage, weight 6 pounds), which is basically a chunk of explosive with a detonator stuck in it.

But in that case id say its a more advanced mix of military grade explosives with a force multiplier on par with nitroglycerin (TNT x 1.5). Otherwise it wouldnt cost so much.
(is there really a game balance associated with such low inventory store costs, I mean when you cant even buy a few demolition packs at $1500 a pop how can you fight a war).

That would bring its firepower up to 9 pounds. And while that's 4Kg not 5Kg (as the prior calculation suggested), the ballpark figures are about the same. Since a difference of (4/5)^1/3 is less than 10% adjustment on the damage itself.

Blaster Launcher Warheads are still on par with being a Hellfire Missile, an Aim-9, and most other air-to-air missiles all by itself.

727

Suggestions / Re: Selective recruitment and Training programs?

« on: August 27, 2014, 03:06:42 am »

That sounds totally crazy and out of left field

But I think it should be possible to adjust "the cut" for what kind of soldier talent you're looking for. If only the overall quality of their roster sheet.

I look for basically 3 stats when looking at a soldier's sheet (in this order) - Firing Accuracy, Strength, Time Units.

Guys with Firing Accuracy in the 40s or strength of 22 or less I immediately sack and hire another soldier. Either that or they go to one of the backup "storage" facilities to just stand guard in case of a base attack (standard outlay for those bases is 10 soldiers + 4 HWPs).

I do think you should be able to set a slider (maybe 3 levels) of training quality for soldiers, with an initial Signing Bonus for those who are gifted. Then basically out of the box you have a soldier who might be advanced as if he had already gone on 3-5 or 5-8 missions already.
* Normal - As per default
* Intermediate - +$30,000 signing bonus, higher expectations (most stats will be decent or good for a starting squaddie, they dont have any dump stats).
* Professional - +$100,000 signing bonus. Highest standard, most stats near the highest likely in each category for a starting soldier under normal conditions (TU near 70, good reactions, firing accuracy near 70, strength near 40, etc). You still get a random amount though, and you cannot control psi strength (because who would know such a thing exists?)


So you would really be paying through the nose for a soldier who will likely die from being shot once, but at later points in the game when you have $10 Million or more, and you really need those guys to hit their targets and carry alot of crap . . . its more than worth it to hire GOOD soldiers who can get the job done.

This in contrast to ordering an HWP for the price of ten soldiers, which will not gain veterancy, and has such a big bullseye on it that it will be the first to go down even though it has good armor.

728

Suggestions / Re: XCOM "Last Stand" Mode after Council Termination

« on: August 27, 2014, 02:32:13 am »

@Dioxine
Actually that was the impression I got, that there is a huge huge shaft above each Hangar which the aircraft lifts off through.

This is why all of the Xcom aircraft have VTOL. Skyrangers and Interceptors do not take off and land like normal planes even if they can. And all of the hybrid craft can do it implicitly.

Also notice that when you send an aircraft off on an interception mission, there is a few minutes where the plane just sits there hovering over the base before it starts moving. Determined primarily by its "Acceleration" stat I think. If the plane had to vertical takeoff its way up a 300-600 meter shaft that would take a few minutes I think.

Then up at the surface its like some james bond or batman setup where there's an external hangar hatch camouflaged to look like normal scenery. Plane comes out, takes off like a bat out of hell.

729

Suggestions / Re: Civvies outside Terror Missions

« on: August 27, 2014, 02:09:54 am »

Id like to see Dead Civvie Corpses.
Those farmers be dead long before you show up or they ran the hell away.

As for a terror mission its quite clear from the Intro Cinematic that the aliens get dropped out of the ship by some kind of grav lift and then the ship just takes off and leaves them. Having the ship sitting there on the ground in some giant parking lot just makes it a target for multiple Cruise Missile strikes anyway and the ETs would know better.

730

Suggestions / Re: It makes no sense that alien ships have no outward damage.

« on: August 26, 2014, 11:02:50 pm »

Considering that Explosion Size in vanilla xcom is directly proportional to explosion damage . . .
And in real life the size of an explosion increases by the Cube Root (3rd power) of its firepower this dictates . . .

The relationship between Damage and Firepower is of the 3rd power.

If we consider that a Hand Grenade has 1/2 Kilo of High Explosive in it (which does 50 damage) . . . then a Blaster Launcher (200 damage) has as much firepower as (200/50)^3 divided by two kilograms of high explosive.

Handheld Blaster Launcher warheads have a conventional explosive power equal to about 30 Kilograms of plastic explosive.


Considering the officially stated yields of various kinds of air-to-air missiles most of them have between 10 and 50 Kilograms of high explosive. The Hellfire air-to-ground missile itself has like 30 pounds (15 kilograms) so even it does a little less damage than a Blaster Warhead (about 160 damage).

So that means conventional air-to-air missiles actually explode for a Battlescape equivalent of 140 to 240 Explosive Damage depending on the kind of missile.
Stingray Missiles are pretty small in the base inventory (0.4 each) so that means they're probably in this range.

Avalanche Missiles are more like the Phoenix Missile, legendary for both its range (100 miles) and its firepower (650 pounds, or 300 kilogram warhead). But who knows maybe it does less because its range is also alot less too. Its probably still doing the equivalent of 300 Explosive Damage in battlescape though.

So how much you think a Fusion Ball striking for 230 air-combat damage is gonna do on the battlefield? If its nearest equivalent only does 100 points.

===

However Air Combat takes a bunch of other things into consideration too, and sometimes less things into consideration than battlescape. This is the overall Effectiveness of the weapons, firing at an evasive aircraft which an indirect shot will probably bounce off of like D&D Armor Class.

Air to Air missiles typically rely on Fragmentation damage to blow up enemy aircraft via a proximity blast. This is useless against alien UFOs though because shrapnel is peanuts to alien alloys, it takes dierct hit shaped charge explosives to damage them.

The cannon rounds probably have their efefct because they would be Depleted Uranium.

731

Suggestions / Re: Mobile bases

« on: August 26, 2014, 10:36:41 pm »

You mean like Starcraft or Command & Conquer (or perhaps Bioshock)?
LAWL

I guess it would be cool for modders but it would normally not fit with xcom stuff at all

732

Suggestions / Re: Making Base Defense Facilities More Useful

« on: August 25, 2014, 11:51:44 pm »

What do you mean by "50% HP and done"?

It was listed somewhere else in another forum post that it only takes 50% max damage inflicted on an alien ship to bring it down. . . and 100% or greater Destroys the ship (and leaves no crash site).

So for a Battleship that means 1500 damage brings it down, 3000 damage destroys it completely.

The tiny Scout ships only have 50 max damage, so that's why just about any weapon besides the Cannon will usually destroy them without leaving a crash site to explore.


I can see why the vanilla game didn't make a distinction though when it comes to base defense. The ship is hovering right over your base. If you don't Destroy it completely it just gets "Hurt" and has to land anyway, and then the enemy personnel have still been delivered to your base.

733

Suggestions / Re: XCOM "Last Stand" Mode after Council Termination

« on: August 25, 2014, 11:44:03 pm »

The impression I got was XCom facilities were "Deep Underground Military Bases" otherwise known as D.U.M.B.s. Which are another piece of black-ops-lore.

No bunkerbuster cruise missile is going to penetrate a quarter mile of solid earth (or more!). And the Xcom access doors are basically a series of airlocks so dropping a Thermobaric weapon close to the entrance isnt going to nix them with overpressure either (like it might do to taliban cave complexes).

Ground assault has no problem with this because they just cut the doors with thermite (or aliens got their own non-inventory-item plasma cutter to do the same job). Thats why they come in through the Access Elevator or the Hangar.

Reminds me of some episodes of Stargate SG-1 where the Goa-uld invade earth and attack Cheyenne Mountain. They have a mothership sitting on top of the mountain but they have to send jaffa down the access points, and with their tech they have no problems cutting or blasting through the doors. Then well, we get a classic XCOM-esque Base Defense scenario (but they lose because they are vastly outnumbered and out-gunned).

===

Construction of the base facilities is probably more an issue of paying for the things that are going to be put in them, rather than the digging and tunneling of them (which would cost millions, and is probably provided by other black ops budget funds that the player never sees or touches). Somebody else does the digging for you.

Building Time for the construction is probably 5 Days + 5 Days per Square. Then additional time for however long it takes to procure and install the equipment that is being put in them. At least that formula looks to be accurate for most of the facilities.

734

Suggestions / Re: Armoured cilivans?

« on: August 25, 2014, 11:31:04 pm »

But yeah, from my estimation, the X-com teams for some reason and wandering around with Level II or IIIA at most, which brings up the idea behind the tactical armor mods.

@KingMob - What I gathered was that X-Com teams require high maneuverability, agility, and flexibility and they cannot be weighed down with bulky armor. Just look at the impact it has on your performance when you have a guy carrying too much stuff and he loses 25-35% of his TU.

One nice modification would be researchable armor like the Talon system - borderline nanotechnology - with liquid armor that hardens when shot. That would give armor that was flexible and light enough but comparable to Alloy Armor against certain damage types. But the Alloy Armor is still better because the Talon system wouldnt give good protection against anything heat related (plasma, laser).

but it was never assumed to be .50 bmg

@Dioxine
The Sniper Rifle Mod states clearly in the ufopaedia text that it is 12.7mm (which any day of the week is a .50cal). This being the sniper rifle mod that is in the Top 10 downloads slot on OpenXcom's mod hosting venue.
Screenshot From Mod Site

And its true that a .50 isnt necessarily a .50bmg . . . but thats what most people assume when they see that. Either that or 12.7x108mm russian which is a hair bit worse (by about 1500 ft-lbs).

Alternative .50cal rifles such as .50 Beowulf and the 12.7mm VSSK are obscure newcomers on the scene. And the .50 AE is known widely to be the "desert eagle bullet" and not associated with precision Rifle shooting in any way.

Im aware of the difference between penetration and damage, and I am happy that you are too. 

In my own game systems im designing (predominantly RPG at this point) I have both stats. I tend to run penetration as a "compare vs armor, then assign a damage penalty". That way you can have armor that provides no protection whatsoever because the penetration was too high, or armor that stops all the damage completely. And for things that don't stop shots, they still contribute somewhat against Overpenetration.

For example a .50bmg in mine does AP 10, compared to a 5.56mm which does AP 7 and just about any other standard pistol or shotgun does AP 4. (an armor piercing bullet adds 1)

What is the difference compared to armor rating?
Every point of armor rating over the AP imposes a -1 damage point per die (basically -20% damage, after its rolled, and it scales with critical hit damage too). After about a difference of 4 or more it just hand-waives that the armor stops the shot completely, that armor is invincible against that weapon unless the shooter makes a called shot for a weakpoint.

Likewise if the AP = AR it gets no damage reduction. So a light kevlar vest might have like AR 7 which means a 5.56mm goes right through it. But it imposes -3 damage per die against a Glock9mm or Shotgun. Considering the damage dice are all some small pile of d10s which average about 5 points each thats most of the damage, and a fair bit of the time it will do 0.

so it was rarely that useful

@Vulgar Monkey - True, its just that we're handed these items as players and told to "have fun" and figure out how to use them on our own. So we come up with different strategies.

Me for example, I always use the Heavy Cannon as a multi-shot grenade launcher. As mama always said close counts when it comes to shotguns, and grenades. And its faster than tossing a Grenade so I always use HE rounds (and at least up until OpenXcom, you had to wait until the end of the turn for a grenade to go off). I always give the guy using it a Laser Pistol or comparable sidearm so he can shoot someone point blank without blowing himself up.

In TFTD I usually keep some AP rounds with him too. Because of all the close quarters action in that game and the numerous opportunities to close into close quarters, firing at someone only 4-5 spaces away makes up for the bad accuracy. But in TFTD the Gas Cannon is the way to go because the Autocannon equivalent only works underwater . . . so I might have 3 guys equipped with Gas Cannons (two of them using HE, one who is using AP and maneuvering for close range).

Against Floaters and Sectoids, who are some of the most common enemies in the game, Poor Accuracy is offset by "if I get it within 2 squares of the guy he's dead". Plus it works marvellously towards getting rid of grass, hedges, fences, and blowing a hole in the side of a brick wall. Then the Sniper Guy I have armed with a good accuracy weapon has a line of fire into somewhere (but the Sniper usually has a Rocket Launcher with a pile of Large Rockets, so that way close really does count).

For me the only weapon which makes the Heavy Cannon obsolete is the Heavy Plasma because I can just autofire until I hit something, one shot does the job, and it does a good job of blowing holes in walls. I dont need blast radius anymore with that. And in TFTD everyone has 3 sonic pulsers, for the grenade relay from hell.

For high damage output early in the game I give someone an Autocannon with AP rounds and I sneak them in within about 10-12 squares, or closer if I can manage it. Then they take 42 twice or three times in a row. And if im afraid one shot wont do the job and I dont wanna risk it . . . I do a Hand Grenade Relay.


Small Launcher (or Thermal Shok Launcher) is nice but it doesnt blow holes in walls . . . and I much rather prefer the Extra Points I get for KILLING an alien (sometimes as many as 25) compared to Capturing it (which is always 10). Nevermind its slow as hell and doesn't have much ammo (two shots per 2x1 inventory space compared to 6, plus 15 TU reload after every single shot).

Often times I find myself moving a soldier over to the alien to use a Medi Kit to revive the sucker so that i can put a killing shot into them. And sometimes having to revive him again if he's stubborn. Because its hard as hell to coup-de-grace a Lobsterman with a grenade (alien or otherwise).

Its a pity you cant just do a Coup-De-Grace on something with a regular weapon.

735

Programming / Re: Base size & damage calculation

« on: August 25, 2014, 06:59:31 am »

I would like to request that the Damage Calculation be stored in Ruleset somewhere so that it can be custom edited.