OpenXcom Forum
OpenXcom => Open Feedback => Topic started by: Inglonias on May 08, 2013, 10:54:23 pm
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In battles through the main campaign, the enemies have a lot more reaction fire than they did in the DOS version of the game. It's very odd. This may just be because the AI is different, or because I still suck at this game more than I thought. Either way, the game feels more difficult than it once did.
EDIT: This mystery has been solved.
i added a small function to the spawn code to make all aliens within a short radius (approximately maximum fire distance) of your landing craft start off facing towards your ramp.
because i hate your soldiers and i want them dead.
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You need to remember that you may have enabled the "sneaky AI" feature, in which alien will actually hide from openxcom units and will use cover as much as possible. Plus i think our initial suck a lot :)
There are a few changes and it does feel like the game is a bit more difficult, you can stand in the middle of an open field and hope none will shoot at you, remember to kneel and use cover.
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You need to remember that you may have enabled the "sneaky AI" feature, in which alien will actually hide from openxcom units and will use cover as much as possible. Plus i think our initial suck a lot :)
There are a few changes and it does feel like the game is a bit more difficult, you can stand in the middle of an open field and hope none will shoot at you, remember to kneel and use cover.
Sneaky AI is off.
Thanks for the help. I realize that the AI is different, and actually a bit better in some ways.
Although it is a valid tactic, it feels unfair that there are usually so many aliens camping the Skyranger. That's the biggest difference in the AI. They camp my landing vehicle.
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burn turn one, use smoke.
i added a small function to the spawn code to make all aliens within a short radius (approximately maximum fire distance) of your landing craft start off facing towards your ramp.
because i hate your soldiers and i want them dead.
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burn turn one, use smoke.
i added a small function to the spawn code to make all aliens within a short radius (approximately maximum fire distance) of your landing craft start off facing towards your ramp.
because i hate your soldiers and i want them dead.
...Hate you... so much...
Changed the thread title. Because you're mean. You are a mean person. You meanie.
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burn turn one, use smoke.
i added a small function to the spawn code to make all aliens within a short radius (approximately maximum fire distance) of your landing craft start off facing towards your ramp.
because i hate your soldiers and i want them dead.
Never realized that feature :) i guess is logical, if you see a ship landing you want to face it :) after all they know we are coming to kill them!!! :)
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Never realized that feature :) i guess is logical, if you see a ship landing you want to face it :) after all they know we are coming to kill them!!! :)
Nevertheless, I feel that this is something that should go in Advanced Options.
Because I love my soldiers the money I use to hire new soldiers and want them to live
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Nevertheless, I feel that this is something that should go in Advanced Options.
Because I love my soldiers the money I use to hire new soldiers and want them to live
Although i agree with you, how about not making that change and changing something else.
How about we make all earth based tech ships create a cloud of "debris" when they land as such this will provide cover to our agent and teh alien will still get first dibs on an idiot that walks too far :)
The reason for only earth base tech ship is because we know alien use magic advanced technology (anti-gravity) as the propulsion system as such... blah blah blah.
If you are still making this type of tactical mistakes by the time you get alien based tech ships then your units deserve to die :P
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Although i agree with you, how about not making that change and changing something else.
How about we make all earth based tech ships create a cloud of "debris" when they land as such this will provide cover to our agent and teh alien will still get first dibs on an idiot that walks too far :)
The reason for only earth base tech ship is because we know alien use magic advanced technology (anti-gravity) as the propulsion system as such... blah blah blah.
If you are still making this type of tactical mistakes by the time you get alien based tech ships then your units deserve to die :P
Walks too far? I don't even make it off the ramp sometimes! Ah, well. I suppose that's XCOM for you.
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Walks too far? I don't even make it off the ramp sometimes! Ah, well. I suppose that's XCOM for you.
In Vanilla it was strange that my soldiers were shot in the first turn while descending the ramp of the skyranger. However in openxcom it is exactly the contrary. In my first missions I was losing between 2 or 3 men in the first turn because of this.
To avoid this, since then in my first turn I throw a smoke granade into the ground infront of the ramp and then start the deployment on the second turn. Since then I don't remember losing a man on the ramp, I became too cautions in that sense (I play in auto-ironman mode).
In OpenXcom I have also noticed some positions inside the UFOs are always covered and there is no way of seing the alien first to kill him. He will always be there waiting for you and killing your first man. So you have to figure out new strategies there, granades, mind control units or other explosive amunition ;).
I must admit I love that there is an improved AI. In vanilla after a while it was a little bit embarrasing seing the aliens not doing anything to try to win the battle, just stay there and shoot if you were around running.
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I've noticed this too. I'm getting reaction fire from pretty much every step I take in Alien sight, usually from the same unit. And this is all on Beginner!
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Don't feel bad, just pop a smoke and run into a house. You should read some Murphy's Laws too. Some of them are probably not true, but it's a fun read and gets you ready for almost anything.
https://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php?title=Murphy%27s_Laws_%28X-COM%29
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burn turn one, use smoke.
i added a small function to the spawn code to make all aliens within a short radius (approximately maximum fire distance) of your landing craft start off facing towards your ramp.
because i hate your soldiers and i want them dead.
A excellent feature that makes Logical sense , but still it should be optional.
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It's a feature of the AI.
The AI in OpenXCom is different from the AI in the original.
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So , do all aliens near landing site automatically do this regardless of difficulty or could be be determined on difficulty level and chance?
This sounds like a great feature to me, but when i go try teaching my daughter ( and eventually my son) the wonders of XCOM this should be limited for her, the game is hard enough for adults :)
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I agree. This "welcoming" behaviour should depend on difficulty level.
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There may be a misunderstanding here. It could be that the aliens are really happy to see X-Com. They may be looking forward to learning about our culture and making new friends.
Either that or they're craving some delicious human soup...
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and this is why i should never share information.
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I don't wanna live on a planet where X-COM is reasonable. :(
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i think, aliens are here to kill us, they should have an little advantage if they are arrive (crashed) there first :)
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i think, aliens are here to kill us, they should have an little advantage if they are arrive (crashed) there first :)
Even for Noobs playing on the easiest level???? Personally i love being slaughtered in xcom , that is why i play it , however after trying to get some younger gamers into it, they play one mission and want to curl up into a ball for 3 weeks because they lost all there people :)
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Even for Noobs playing on the easiest level???? Personally i love being slaughtered in xcom , that is why i play it , however after trying to get some younger gamers into it, they play one mission and want to curl up into a ball for 3 weeks because they lost all there people :)
That is called education.
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burn turn one, use smoke.
i added a small function to the spawn code to make all aliens within a short radius (approximately maximum fire distance) of your landing craft start off facing towards your ramp.
because i hate your soldiers and i want them dead.
Now I have 8 incapacitated soldiers from smoke asphyxiation. Saving the world is hard.
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burn turn one, use smoke.
i added a small function to the spawn code to make all aliens within a short radius (approximately maximum fire distance) of your landing craft start off facing towards your ramp.
because i hate your soldiers and i want them dead.
Bullshit! If you really wanted them dead here's what you would do (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCEFOx5Hc2Y). Turning some weak ass floaters toward the ramp is for pussies! >8(
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what, hire an overrated actor to make a sub-par movie about a terrible moment in history?
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what, hire an overrated actor to make a sub-par movie about a terrible moment in history?
Exactly!
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I don't wanna live on a planet where X-COM is reasonable. :(
It should at least be as reasonable as the original. This is a bit too far if you ask me.
At the very least, could it be an option? Adding it just because "lol Xcom is hard" is a bit shallow...
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for the record, i DID adjust this ages ago.
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It should at least be as reasonable as the original. This is a bit too far if you ask me.
At the very least, could it be an option? Adding it just because "lol Xcom is hard" is a bit shallow...
If you're keeping up with the GIT builds, it actually just got a LOT easier, so I don't think the whole aliens-facing-you thing is that bad.
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i never understood why enemies facing a landing craft is so wrong, i know real life doesn't matter when playing a game but realistically if a troop carrier is landing and you are in the ground the first thing you are going to do is shoot the first idiot that pops his/her head out. Heck even with rules in place for war, enemies will shoot and kill non-combatants. because you know what there are NO RULES in war.
Think about every single war/battle scenario the "home advantage" goes to the one that is there first, Aliens are there and since an approaching craft is coming you would think they will be like "hey lets get ready!!!"
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Love the new feature. I put the soldiers I don't like in the front in the first 'wave'. Funny how once they walk out of the smoke grenade they get shot up. That's realistic. I'm also having fun closing with them under the cover of smoke. Hey, in one of the mods they had the 'hit' function. That would be great, would be fun to see how easy it is to knock out a sectoid close up, and how hard it would be with a muton.
I'll put that up on suggestions.
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The bit where the skyranger lands right next to buildings where aliens are probably hiding never made any sense in the original, and it's still stupid.
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That's xcom, baby!
throw a smoke grenade
seriously, with the sometimes tiny maps, I'd rather have a skyranger landing next to a building than having maps without buildings (because that's the other solution to the problem).
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Oh guys, I'm a little concerned how floaters seem to walk around depending on their reaction fire. I'm taking on a very large ship. My men are all over the corridors and the floater walks out and stands facing the wall. Ordinarily I get hit by a lot of reaction fire, but maybe theres some way you can set priorities so that they go for the kill?
Seen something like that happen in the new firaxis product. Chryssalids surround my soldier, next turn they all flee...
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Oh guys, I'm a little concerned how floaters seem to walk around depending on their reaction fire. I'm taking on a very large ship. My men are all over the corridors and the floater walks out and stands facing the wall. Ordinarily I get hit by a lot of reaction fire, but maybe theres some way you can set priorities so that they go for the kill?
Saw something similar on a terror mission with Cyberdiscs. I was trying to get the Cyberdisc and at one point it positioned within LOS of 3 of my units and was still alive by the end of the turn. None of them were even shot at during the alien turn, but it still did reaction fire when I tried to move one of my soldiers out of it's blast zone. Wonder if the "Sneak AI" option is having this kind of effect ... it wants to hide from my guys so ends up doing nothing. I should have lost at least 1, if not 2 soldiers from that particular situation (or at least been fired at).
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Guess I better turn that function off. Good effort, but I've seen too many sectoids run around without shooting up my rookies.
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..and there was me afraid to try sneaky ai
'gets stun rod and explosives..'
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This change of facing the aliens towards the ramp is both a good AND a bad idea. in the original I'm not sure which direction the aliens were facing by default, whether it was random or what, but you could still get one nailing your troops one by one as they try to leave the dropship. That was facilitated by the fact that even though xcom moves first on turn 1, the aliens begin with full TU's to expend upon reaction fire - whereas on any turn OTHER THAN turn 1 you can only take reaction fire with whatever TU's you have left over from your turn. So, it was a bit of a cheat to let aliens have a full turns worth of TU's to take reaction fire, but they also weren't ALWAYS facing the ramp if they happened to be anywhere near it.
With this change the 1st turn threat of the aliens is significantly increased. It's logical that they might be looking at this big machine that just dropped out of the sky next to them, but it's then also logical that Xcom pilots or the troops themselves be able to SEE some of these aliens as they're coming in to land. After all, we are still artificially restricted in where and how we come into a hot LZ. We can't land at the edge of it and THEN move into town. We can't fast rope down from choppers. We can't do HALO parachute jumps. We get no intel on alien positions except the eyes of the individual troops - no sat coverage, no advance drones, no FLIR... Xcom troops are at a serious disadvantage even from what troops had in 1994. They get dropped IN THE MIDDLE of a swarm of angry aliens, and don't see or get a clue where they are until they step off the skyranger.
Had a terror mission yesterday. 5 troops dead on the first step of the ramp, 1 more dead in taking the step to the left off of that top ramp square and THEN he saw what should have be OBVIOUS - 3 cyberdisks in the open, clustered around the corner of the building. The next several troops filed off and started taking them out, but of course the resulting detonation of the closest one killed one more trooper and gravely wounded another - and they were still standing on the ground right next to the ramp.
I still cleared the mission successfully (lost a total of 9 out of 14 troops) but that 1st round bloodbath... It was both brutally excting and challenging AND a horribly frustrating cheat for the aliens.
One of the things I noticed is missing (in the 0.9 build) is something that was a "hidden" feature in the original - on turn 1 you could have troops turn in place inside the skyranger to reveal the terrain to the left and right. You can't do that anymore. I say that if the aliens are going to start turn 1 with full TU's AND facing the ramp then xcom should be able to turn, look out a "window" of the skyranger, and see not just the terrain but also spot/reveal any aliens in view - and all before anyone has to even take the first step off the ramp or throw an already primed smoke grenade.
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I've noticed that though you can't see the ground out of the skyranger cockpit, you can spot aliens through it - and get shot at. Nearly jumped out of the chair first time it happened.
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With this change the 1st turn threat of the aliens is significantly increased.
You mentioned smoke grenades, so you know about them, but, with a single thrown smoke grenade, the threat is virtually eliminated. So, while I agree with the enhanced danger, it can be nullified by a single simple action, so I don't see it as a problem. (Actually, I didn't even know you could pre-prime the grenades until now.) The only time I ever get shot getting off the Skyranger is with the HWP because you can't throw the grenade until it's out of the way.
Also, if you have grenades set to explode on impact (which I use so I'm not tempted to use the really "stupid" grenade relay trick), then you don't even have to wait an entire turn for the smoke cloud to take effect and you can start unloading immediately in relative safety.
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burn turn one, use smoke.
i added a small function to the spawn code to make all aliens within a short radius (approximately maximum fire distance) of your landing craft start off facing towards your ramp.
because i hate your soldiers and i want them dead.
A bullshit change for sure.
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Did you just quit a mission where your soldiers got massacred walking off the skyranger?
You might want to rethink the way you provide feedback on the work others have done for free for our enjoyment. Criticize by all means, but it would be better if it were civil and constructive, like most people above who actually contributed to improving the feature by adapting the feature to the difficulty level.
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Did you just quit a mission where your soldiers got massacred walking off the skyranger?
You might want to rethink the way you provide feedback on the work others have done for free for our enjoyment. Criticize by all means, but it would be better if it were civil and constructive, like most people above who actually contributed to improving the feature by adapting the feature to the difficulty level.
+1
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No, I use smoke most of the time, which mitigates against this change. I chose my tone carefully, to match the irritatingly self-satisfied original.
It's a bs change because one of the stated goals of this project is to be similar to the original out of the box. This isn't similar; it's just a stupid trap for the unwary. If it were a switch you had to throw, it wouldn't bother me.
Devs who want to be treated respectfully need to treat others respectfully.
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Devs who want to be treated respectfully need to treat others respectfully.
Dude, you don't want to go this path, honestly.
You disagree with a choice that was introduced by developers and discussed heavily in the community (developers, modders and players), that's fine.
But if you begin to consider all changes you disagree as a personal offense to you and blaming the developers, then do us all a favor and stick to the original game.
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No, I use smoke most of the time, which mitigates against this change. I chose my tone carefully, to match the irritatingly self-satisfied original.
It's a bs change because one of the stated goals of this project is to be similar to the original out of the box. This isn't similar; it's just a stupid trap for the unwary. If it were a switch you had to throw, it wouldn't bother me.
Devs who want to be treated respectfully need to treat others respectfully.
My comment about losing soldiers was a joke, aimed at how angry your tone seemed to be. If you tell me you did that knowingly, that's not better... I am certain that Warboy doesn't care one way or another about our soldiers, so it seems likely that his comment was also a joke, aimed at how some people like to make him responsible for all their woes.
As far as I am concerned, after coding the alien AI Warboy can certainly be satisfied of himself. That's a huge amount of work and it works really well. You don't like part of it? That's ok. Play on a lower difficulty level if you don't want to get shot up. You can even make yourself a mod that boosts alien stats and deployments back to whichever difficulty level you want if the low difficulty needed to not get shot up is not otherwise difficult enough. The AI is stated to be different from the original, so it's not a trap, it is to be expected.
And don't tell me playing on a lower difficulty and modding things back is too much work. That's nowhere near the amount of work many of us have put into mods and certainly nowhere near the amount of work the devs have put it. You can also just use a tank to take the shots. Or use one of the attack dog or drone mods to lose easily replaceable units instead of valuable soldiers. Or put 2 rookies first, since OpenXCom allows you to reorder them.
There's no reason to disrespect the devs, and that small thing is especially far from being one. Appreciate all that OpenXCom gives you to work with, or if you don't think that's enough, then the original is there for you.
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it's also a two-year old thread. things have changed in the last 24 months, believe it or not.
in fact, if you'd read beyond the first page, you'd already know that.
https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php/topic,1193.msg12046.html#msg12046 (https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php/topic,1193.msg12046.html#msg12046)
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OK, my bad, I apologize.
Arthanor: Sure, it's an impressive achievement. But "jokes" on message boards are often misread; being flip carries that risk. It annoys me to see others' complaints treated that way. Don't like it? Whatever.
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I reserve the right to have a sense of humour, and risk or no, I shall continue to be jovial, whether it annoys you or not.
I mean, for goodness' sake, look at the thread title, he's calling me a "meanie", how am I supposed to respond to that WITHOUT being glib?
lighten up dude. life's too short.
locking the thread, because this has gotten WAY off topic, and there's nothing of value being added to this ancient discussion.