OpenXcom Forum
Modding => Released Mods => Topic started by: snicmtl on February 06, 2017, 09:56:56 pm
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Good day,
While this small modification can barely be called a 'mod' , I feel that I've heard enough people gripe about TFTD regarding the 2 part terror mission on a cruise ship that this was worth posting.
Thanks to the help of Warboy who graciously helped me on the IRC forum, the modification is very simple and can be done by changing a value in the mission script RUL file but here is a mod that does it for you:
https://www.openxcom.com/mod/noshippingterror (https://www.openxcom.com/mod/noshippingterror)
For a laugh, here is somenoe on youtube trying to get past the mission this mod removes:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToZpKZGrb90 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToZpKZGrb90)
After about two hours at it, here is his conclusion on the best technique:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WziO005uM3g (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WziO005uM3g)
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I once found a Bio-Drone hiding in a room, behind an invisible wall that was blocking line of sight. It seemed I had explored the whole ship, but apparently you have to go to different angles in rooms to be sure.
Another time there was a Triscene inside the wall struts hidden behind walls at the front end of the ship.
If someone could fix all of the map bugs in TFTD, and make sure all of the aliens come out of hiding at whatever turn declares their aggressiveness to the max, then I think these missions would cease to be difficult.
(I haven't played TFTD in openxcom yet.)
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If someone could fix all of the map bugs in TFTD, and make sure all of the aliens come out of hiding at whatever turn declares their aggressiveness to the max, then I think these missions would cease to be difficult.
I'm going to disagree on that last part, haha. Even without the hide-and-seek aspect, these are still very difficult missions due to the size and layout of the map (long hallways that the aliens can see down, but you can't), sheer number of aliens and the fact that it's a two part mission.
I have found them very difficult and I think only beaten it once, but so far I've only played it on Superhuman with no armor.
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I didn't mean they'd be easy, I was referring to the game being a difficult sport by wasting player time. Of course you'll still lose soldiers, that's not what I meant. I meant you could find that last alien and move on to finding new ways to lose soldiers sooner. =)
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Ah, all right then, that is true. I was going to say, if you really thought the mission was generally not "difficult" then I'd have to ask you the secret to your ways because those are damn hard for me. :)
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Ah, all right then, that is true. I was going to say, if you really thought the mission was generally not "difficult" then I'd have to ask you the secret to your ways because those are damn hard for me. :)
They're hard for me, but I do have some secrets if you're interested. Ever since I've become an adult, I've stopped save-scumming (for the most part), and yet I have only rarely come into danger of losing a craft. Sometimes I lose a lot of soldiers but usually even on the worst missions I lose less than half. Most missions I lose one or none.
Going around corners is tricky. Aliens love to wait there with plenty of time units, and they usually have very high reactions. As you play enough maps, you start to get a sense for where the aliens are likely to show up. So when you're going around a dangerous corner, make sure you use a soldier with close to full time units and a high reactions score. You can also move away from the corner and approach it diagonally in order to trigger mutual surprise. I've got a video showing that here:
I was unable to figure out how to run TFTD in OpenXcom. There doesn't seem to be an option for it, so I'm not sure what else to try.
Another issue to watch out for is being left in the open to be shot at. You want to plan ahead before you go around that corner, and make sure you have enough shooting power to generally kill whatever is around the other side. In TFTD, sometimes it's difficult to be ready for that, especially in the early game. Once I was on a ship attack against lobstermen, and all I had was gauss rifles. It was the terror mission at the end of the month, first terror mission of the game, and I had lobstermen. Fortunately I packed thermal tazers and magna-pack explosives. I found the trick to taking out lobstermen was to sneak up behind them (or in front of them if that's the only option) and taze them. Then set an explosive over them and exit the room. Turns out even weak grenades kill lobstermen when they're stunned, but I had the big ones anyway.
Now there were more lobstermen than I had explosives, so I took out the first several using this method, and then started putting patrols on the remaining lobstermen to keep them tazed. I could have also surrounded a lobsterman with soldiers and pummeled it to bits with gauss rifles, but I didn't end up needing to do that. I don't remember how many soldiers I lost on that mission, but I kept most of them. I picked up loot along the way since I knew I wasn't going to finish the next level. When I went down to the next level, I scored a couple of kills and exited the mission. It was a "failure", but my score took far less of a hit than it would have if I'd not shown up at all. All of the aliens killed and items recovered made up for most of the civilians killed.
Third point: Ion Armor is weakest on the sides. On my last playthrough, I actually modded the armor and swapped the side and front armor values. I felt this wasn't too cheaty because now the soldier was vulnerable from the front. I left Magnetic Ion Armor unchanged, so I had a choice for armor. Turns out I didn't need to make this change as my improved method of going around corners plus making sure my soldiers have high reactions is really all I need to mostly not get shot.
Fourth point: Tanks are cover. This is the most important strategy you can have in basic landing/crash sites. In UFO Defense, the Skyranger has two spawn nodes near the nose of the craft, meaning there's something like a 90% chance you get shot at as you step out of the craft. This chance is lower or even zero if it's a small scout or your soldier has a very high reactions score. It's less binary in TFTD but the aliens in TFTD have generally higher reactions scores. But if you just assume the first unit out will be shot at, then let it be a tank. I used to get bothered that the tank would step out, get shot at 2-3 times, and be destroyed. But then I realized it saved me 2-3 soldiers. On superhuman, sometimes the tank is disposable. I've been playing my games with "Guardian" tanks (more defense, less attack) for years now, but even before that it was never all that difficult to buy a new cannon tank/coelacanth after every big mission for the first few months.
If your tank survives exiting the craft, you can have soldiers hide behind it. The tank is not only a movable wall, it has vision and can tell you if the coast is clear for your soldiers to duck out from behind it. It also has a very low reaction score, meaning it can move just a bit and trigger aliens to react and empty out their remaining time units. Then you pop your soldiers out and mow em all down.
Fifth point: knowing when to quit. To some extent, getting used to the game gives you a lot of foresight. Sometimes I enter a mission expecting to flee (generally only in TFTD), like when I landed at an alien base once just to get a feel for how difficult it was going to be. I brought PWT Launchers to breach the wall to the exit, and I was practicing making a run past the mind-controlling Tasoths to get to the safer Lobstermen below. Turned out my strategy was so effective that even though I brought rookies, I got pretty much all of them to the exit and went down a level. The most difficult part of the mission was actually escorting them back to the exit area, as they spawned all spread out, one of them was something like two whole turns from even seeing an elevator that would take him up to the exit floor. But I think I got them home safely. Next time I made sure I brought sonic cannons just in case I made it inside. Brought that base down like a bawss.
In my latest UFO game, I had a mission go well until I had most of the aliens killed, then it suddenly went sour and my troops started dropping like flies. The aliens got some lucky shots and I didn't have personal armor yet. Worst part was they were holed up in places I couldn't easily get to without exposing my troops to fire, and all of my breachers (high reactions troops) were dead. It hurt my pride (and my elerium stores), but I retreated and left the ship intact. I also got to keep at least half of my soldiers.
But just because you got a lot of deaths doesn't mean it's time to leave. On my first terror site I had no armor and was up against sectoids. All we brought was laser pistols, heavy cannons, and two tanks: a guardian and an assault cannon tank (assault tank = high offense, low defense). I got off to a good start and killed multiple sectoids, but I was struggling to take down those cyberdiscs. Second or third turn I was up against three of them and my soldiers kept missing, or the shots that did hit weren't taking them out. I'd get one hit, and the cyberdisc would turn around and shoot back, killing the soldier. My assault tank helped me take out a couple of the cyberdiscs, and things started to come back into pace. I didn't have very many soldiers left and their morale was strained, the assault tank was destroyed, but there weren't a lot of aliens left and all of the cyberdiscs were dead. The most dangerous part was trying to find all of the high-ranking sectoids lurking in the shadows. But I knew if I kept my cool, I could find safe ways to approach their hiding spots. Mission was a "success", though it remains today a black stain on my memorial. Worth it, we're here to protect the citizens of Earth.
Last point: knowing when to save-scum. If you're like most adults and want to avoid cheating, then you'll want to steer clear of save-scumming for the most part. But sometimes it's warranted. If you mis-click and your soldier wastes all their time units and winds up in the middle of a clearing asking to be shot, or if your soldier thinks they have a perfect line of fire but the shot keeps hitting some invisible hitbox, or if for any other reason the interface lies to you, a bug in the game hurts your crew, or you do something you didn't mean to do, then it's not really cheating to go back and try it again. Also it's just no fun to be going along great and have one bad die roll completely trash your game. The other day I landed my elite crew at a landed supply ship, desperate to save India from succumbing to the aliens. I was picturing my weapons and armor, and thinking oh man if this is Ethereals I'm screwed! But it probably won't be! ;D It was Ethereals. :o Cue save-scumming the rest of the mission. India still left the council, my penance perhaps. But I'm still enjoying this game, as opposed to starting over in a new game, so I call that a win.
If you're a child or teenager and love cheating, then don't take this against your pride. Some of my best memories are from when I used to cheat my way through games. But pay attention here, because one day you probably won't feel like cheating anymore, and if you haven't studied how to play by the rules by then, you might find yourself struggling at easier difficulty settings or cheating out of frustration. Neither of those are a fun way to play. And if you're an adult who enjoys cheating, hey it's your choice. Don't let anyone tell you how to have fun.
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You can also move away from the corner and approach it diagonally in order to trigger mutual surprise. I've got a video showing that here:
I was unable to figure out how to run TFTD in OpenXcom. There doesn't seem to be an option for it, so I'm not sure what else to try.
Thanks for the tip on going around corners. I had heard of "mutual surprise" but didn't exactly know what it was.
And if you want to play TFTD, you need to go to the Options, Mods, and then at the top where it says "Game Type" you select Terror From The Deep. Then hit "OK."
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Thanks for the tip on going around corners. I had heard of "mutual surprise" but didn't exactly know what it was.
And if you want to play TFTD, you need to go to the Options, Mods, and then at the top where it says "Game Type" you select Terror From The Deep. Then hit "OK."
Thanks! I got TFTD working.
Mutual surprise is whenever you see the aliens at the same time as they see you. When you both see each other at the same time, reaction fire cannot occur. But if you move in front of the alien after you see each other, they can react. One major reason night missions are difficult is because the aliens use your soldiers' light radius to determine visibility, so they see you before you see them.
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Good day,
While this small modification can barely be called a 'mod' , I feel that I've heard enough people gripe about TFTD regarding the 2 part terror mission on a cruise ship that this was worth posting.
Have you considered removing only the 2nd part of the ship mission? Or even changing the settings so that you either get the first or the second part but never both on a terror mission? It can be done with a ruleset change.
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Have you considered removing only the 2nd part of the ship mission? Or even changing the settings so that you either get the first or the second part but never both on a terror mission? It can be done with a ruleset change.
Hey, I like this mission! :P
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Have you considered removing only the 2nd part of the ship mission? Or even changing the settings so that you either get the first or the second part but never both on a terror mission? It can be done with a ruleset change.
I Second this. The 2-stage thing sucks, but having at least one or the other would be nice. I'd hate to remove such a unique mission from the game all together.
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Thirded, please.
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You guys are crazy
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You guys are crazy
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Hello, is there something similar to this mod but that makes these missions one-stage instead of two-stages?
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Hello, is there something similar to this mod but that makes these missions one-stage instead of two-stages?
I'm afraid there is not - or I never heard about something like that at least. As you can see, TFTD still has very few mods.
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I think it would be nice to have a mod which makes most of the shipping lane missions one-stage, but occasionally gives you a two-stage mission. It's fun to have that big struggle once in a while, but it gets annoying and stale when it happens month after month.
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I think it would be nice to have a mod which makes most of the shipping lane missions one-stage, but occasionally gives you a two-stage mission. It's fun to have that big struggle once in a while, but it gets annoying and stale when it happens month after month.
In other words: more ship types of various size?
Yeah, it'd be great.
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Yeah, more ship variants would be great. I'm thinking about more terror sites actually - ocean labs, offshore oil rigs, island military bases etc - because this is what I would like to see in TFTD.
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Link to the mod no longer works. Is there anywhere else we can find this, or find out how to do it ourselves?
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Is this the mod you mean as I still have a copy of it?