8686
Playthroughs / Re: Let's Play OpenXcom: Now on Android!
« on: July 16, 2015, 05:09:52 pm »
Nein, hazmat suits are for US government guys... that kind which always dies in B-movies... pyromaniacs only need a little bit of luck.
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8687
Playthroughs / Re: What do I do to make the game more challenging?
« on: July 16, 2015, 04:39:17 pm »I would rather give the alien the ability to shot at you from out of sight if they have a LOF at you, as long as you get spotted by another alien.
Yeah, I would like that as well.
I would even go further than that and allow them to shoot if they themselves have spotted you already before and still have LoF, but no LoS. That would eliminate another rather typical AI abuse: spot the alien... make one step back... and shoot without having to worry about retaliation.
But it's all non-vanilla behaviour, somebody would have to make it configurable/moddable.
8688
Playthroughs / Re: Let's Play OpenXcom: Now on Android!
« on: July 16, 2015, 01:42:13 pm »
Soldier name: Meridian
Personality: pyromaniac
Weapon: Flamethrower and grenades
Skills: strength > 30, reactions > 45
Position in the flying coffin: 3rd row on the left
Personality: pyromaniac
Weapon: Flamethrower and grenades
Skills: strength > 30, reactions > 45
Position in the flying coffin: 3rd row on the left
8689
Released Mods / Re: [TOTAL CONVERSION] The Piratez Mod - 0.9.j - 9 May - Holiday Edition
« on: July 16, 2015, 12:50:20 pm »you can tell me how you installed the mod.Maybe i did something wrong.
Here's the installation video: https://youtu.be/fRgA8rDRJGw
Let us know if it helped.
8690
XPiratez / Re: [TOTAL CONVERSION] Piratez Extended - 0.92 - 25 Jun
« on: July 15, 2015, 09:19:48 pm »8691
Playthroughs / Re: What do I do to make the game more challenging?
« on: July 15, 2015, 09:15:01 pm »
Everyone can play as they wish; if you like to play with supersoldiers only, it's your choice.
Important is what's fun for you... not what anyone writes anywhere... if abusing every possible exploit is fun for you, who am I to tell you otherwise.
Important is what's fun for you... not what anyone writes anywhere... if abusing every possible exploit is fun for you, who am I to tell you otherwise.
8692
XPiratez / Re: [TOTAL CONVERSION] Piratez Extended - 0.92 - 25 Jun
« on: July 15, 2015, 04:31:48 pm »
Take it easy Dioxine... if he's completely new (it looks like he is), it's absolutely normal not being able to follow installation instructions to the letter. I deal with that almost every day.
@Sagefox: I will create a video how to do it and upload it on YouTube today... if it doesn't help, you'll need to send us some more info. If it helps, we'd like to hear what you did wrong afterwards, so that we can make installation instructions even more foolproof (sorry for the expression, nothing personal)
@Sagefox: I will create a video how to do it and upload it on YouTube today... if it doesn't help, you'll need to send us some more info. If it helps, we'd like to hear what you did wrong afterwards, so that we can make installation instructions even more foolproof (sorry for the expression, nothing personal)
8693
Playthroughs / Re: What do I do to make the game more challenging?
« on: July 15, 2015, 11:05:59 am »Agreed on most points; although I think that 3d explosions and alt movement give more to the game than they take away - in other words, I think the price (game getting easier) is worth paying.
Agreed, I play with alternate movement too... it's fun. I was just answering the question, how to make the game harder.
The second issue touches on the issue of supersoldiers, though. I am on the fence with this. Sure - reloading is straight cheating. Training abuse is cheating too. In both cases the player pays with his own time and effort, so like most cheats, in the end, the player only cheats himself... And I agree that every soldier has the right of dying with honor. But what if they don't die? After all, it's one of core game concepts - we want the soldiers to survive to get better stats. Not even from the standpoint of the game being easier then, but from the standpoint of RPG - seeing them grow is a reward in itself. Sure removing the aspect of growth would make the game more fair, but also much more boring...
About RPG... I am not saying RPG elements don't belong to the game... they certainly do... every game nowadays is a genre-mix. It makes for more memorable moments, deeper immersion, etc. I remember how I was angry they introduced heroes into Warcraft III... but it made the game better. And my all time most favourite game HoMM 3 also has RPG elements, although being a strategy game. What I want to say is that Xcom should stay a strategy game with RPG elements (like HoMM 3) and not become RPG game with strategy elements (like M&M 6). I know... the analogy is completely overexaggerated, just wanted to illustrate the point... some people really do play only with 8 starting soldiers from beginning to end, reloading at every death (I did it myself many years ago... with 4 soldiers... and I was wondering why I get no promotions even to sargeants... and then suddenly their stats were bigger than 255 and overflown to 0... imagine the kid's frustration at that point :-)
The best option, perhaps, would be retirement. Because seriously, how many missions would humanity demand from its defender? Surviving 20, 30 missions is more than enough to be called a hero. An open-ended contract (implied 0% chance of survival) would realistically be very harmful to morale. But as of now, a kicked-out soldier is not even kept in the Memorial. It would be much more fun if you could retire a soldier with honors if his record would be kept in some "hall of heroes" of sorts. Because supersoldiers, too, get boring after a while and fresh blood is always fun - new names, new faces, new stories.
Alternatively, there could be the need to re-negotiate contracts with experienced soldiers, each new contract being more and more expensive. This would increase the incentive to retire a soldier (but would keep the option for "calling for heroes" - drawing from the retired ranks at a very high cost).
The latter idea is basically moot in a standard game, though, where you're provided with all the money you'll ever need and then some.
I quite like the concept from Long War, where the soldiers suffer from fatigue. So you can't take your supersoldiers-to-be on 20 missions in a row... but only every third mission maybe. Which makes 60 missions to improve to supersoldier status... which is long enough so that it's not worth abusing... maybe except in PirateZ where 60 missions is still only the beginning of the game
wink wink
8694
Released Mods / Re: [COMPILATION] Final Mod Pack (FMP)
« on: July 15, 2015, 10:36:12 am »unfortunately those are not the same as the FMP games i am currently playing, whereby i dont have laser weapons and i have to fight 10 cyberdiscs
The last one (beginning of March) is a FMP game.
And if I remember correctly, I had lots of Cyberdiscs as well... and no laser weapons.
8695
Released Mods / Re: [COMPILATION] Final Mod Pack (FMP)
« on: July 15, 2015, 08:42:25 am »
<shamelessSelfPromotion>
Some examples of early Sectoid/Cyberdisc terror missions on Superhuman:
- end of January: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYbxOJw0m6k&index=9&list=PLe0K-GUDQkNIhI8tBeYKHa_VoVYeVW67R
- end of February: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IYBX0mzMuc&index=15&list=PLe0K-GUDQkNIhI8tBeYKHa_VoVYeVW67R
- beginning of March: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3H25c8xQGEs&index=19&list=PLe0K-GUDQkNIFsiJLbZIfaoRVsY5qmx09
</shamelessSelfPromotion>
Some examples of early Sectoid/Cyberdisc terror missions on Superhuman:
- end of January: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYbxOJw0m6k&index=9&list=PLe0K-GUDQkNIhI8tBeYKHa_VoVYeVW67R
- end of February: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IYBX0mzMuc&index=15&list=PLe0K-GUDQkNIhI8tBeYKHa_VoVYeVW67R
- beginning of March: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3H25c8xQGEs&index=19&list=PLe0K-GUDQkNIFsiJLbZIfaoRVsY5qmx09
</shamelessSelfPromotion>
8696
Playthroughs / Re: What do I do to make the game more challenging?
« on: July 15, 2015, 08:34:42 am »One that I find quite cheesy/cheaty is using an interceptor to prolong terror sites, giving you a daytime mission rather than a night.
Thanks, forgot about that one. I have updated the first post.
8697
Playthroughs / What do I do to make the game more challenging?
« on: July 14, 2015, 08:21:34 pm »
Hi all,
several people have asked me what do I do to make the game more challenging, i.e. harder.
What mods, settings, rules, etc.
To answer all such questions at once, I decided to make this post.
I will ignore mods completely and talk only about vanilla OpenXcom... but similar principles apply to most (if not all) mods as well.
---
So, first of all, to make the game harder, you have to eliminate (or dumb down) things that make it too easy.
Let me illustrate this key point/idea on something I've seen on IRC yesterday:
"07:49 every tactic is appropriate in winning"
That is true, if you are fighting a real war (actually since humanity developed wartime conduct, even this is not true anymore), but in a computer game this has severe consequences.
If every tactic is allowed, then I can just use a squad full of super-psi-soldiers and win every mission without ever leaving the Skyranger. If you want a proof, look at BattleBunny's latest LP (second half of it).
Summary: You need to limit the use of tactics and game mechanics that make the game too easy.
---
Now, when we know we need to set some rules, let's discuss what can we do.
The game is basically divided into two parts: geoscape and battlescape.
In geoscape, there is very little potential to make the game truly harder (and a lot of potential to just make it annoying instead).
First option would be to make the dogfights harder (e.g. attack with one interceptor only; or use inferior weapons only, etc.). But since the game can be won without ever shooting down any UFO (for proof see my Hawaii challenge LP), this is of little importance.
Second option would be to make economy-based constraints with implications such as more expensive staff, craft and equipment; longer research, etc. And that might seem like a perfect way to make the game harder.... until you realize that it doesn't make the game "harder" in any way... it just makes the game *longer*. Oh and btw. it is possible to win the game with starting tech (plus Cydonia-or-Bust and Avenger), you don't need better weapons, you don't need any armour (although it looks funny to walk on Mars without helmets), you don't need experienced soldiers... you can win with a bunch of rookies carrying rocket launchers, heavy cannons, HE packs and flares (I would give you a proof but I don't remember who did it on camera).
So, what's left are rules for battlescape...
Summary: If you want to make the game longer, download one of many mods, which make the tech tree more complicated and/or economy more tight (Solarius' FMP, Hobbes' Redux, Hellrazor's Hardmode, etc.). If you want to make the game harder... continue reading.
---
Now we know we need to set some rules for the battlescape to eliminate the "cheesy" (sometimes even "cheaty") stuff.
So, what is cheesy?
What makes the game "not challenging" anymore?
If you want a text book example check out Ivan Dogovich's "Up Close and Personal" mod.
There is a weapon called "Advanced Flash Bang"... a super-effective stun grenade, which doesn't give aliens any chance of success whatssoever (especially with instant grenades option turned on).
That's cheesy.
I know that everybody will have a different view on what is cheesy in vanilla, so I will name only things, which I believe most of us can agree on. Eliminating those should cover 90% of cheesiness in the game.
Cheaty:
1. Reloading
Cheesy:
2. Abuse of psionics
3. Supersoldiers
4. Abuse of explosives
5. Abuse of AI
Summary: Don't worry, I will go into details. Please continue reading.
---
1. Reloading... is sometimes necessary, especially if you are playing with mods that are not 100% stable yet. But in most cases, autosave is enough.
Not reloading is the single most effective way of making the game harder. For those who don't have a strong enough will (98% of us), turn on the Ironman mode, to escape temptation.
Your best soldier dying is part of the game. Your most favourite soldier dying is part of the game. You making a stupid mistake is part of the game. You making a misclick is part of the game. Everything else (expect for game crashes) is part of the game!
Btw. this option almost entirely eliminates also issue #3 (supersoldiers)... more about that later.
Summary: DON'T RELOAD! If you can't resist, play with Ironman mode on. If you rage quit on Ironman, go play with Barbie instead.
PS: as a funny fact, if you decide to allow reload anyway (I don't blame you)... consider turning save scumming ON. Basically both options are cheesy, but here's my explanation why:
- With save scumming OFF - every time you reload, everything will be the same... so you can reload until you develop a perfect recipe for the problem at hand.
- With save scumming ON - every time you reload, everything will be different... so your original problem will disappear... but at least it may be replaced by a different, maybe even harder problem
---
2. Abuse of psionics... as I mentioned before, you can win every mission by having a handful of psi-freaks while hardly moving from the safety of the skyranger.
I will not give you any specific advice here, one man's meat is another man's poison... so decide for yourselves, what do you want to do about it.
For inspiration: I am taking no more than 2-3 psi-amps on any given mission. And even then I am using mind control "with care".
Summary: Give aliens a chance ffs... you'll enjoy the game more, trust me!
---
3. Supersoldiers... are soldiers, which have survived 20+ missions and their stats have increased significantly (e.g. strength = 60+, firing accuracy = 90+, psi skill = 60+, etc.)
With several of these, you can run around with rocket launcher, three rockets, heavy plasma, five alien grenades, medi-kit and psi-amp... while every shot will be a hit, every throw a kill and every mind control a success. A lot of fun, if you're playing for the first time... afterwards... not so much.
If you follow the above and below recommendations (i.e. don't reload and don't abuse), such soldiers should not exist!
Soldiers have a life expectancy between 1 and 20 missions. Supersoldiers break the balance of the game. "Allow them to die" for the planet, with honour.
You can get supersoldiers in an even cheesier way than honest battle experience (honest only on their side of course, mostly abusive on your side).
You can (ab)use active "training", for example mind control and disarm a muton, and shoot at him at point blank range until you're out of bullets in your pistol; or even better put him in a circle of soldiers and let them reaction fire and train reactions too. Or mind control him many times to improve psi skills.
Does this feel right? Don't answer, it was just a rhetorical question...
Furthermore, there are several settings in OpenXcom, which can also increase your soldier's life expectancy a lot and I recommend to turn them off.
First is the "alternate movement methods"... being able to "run" for cover is a life saver; so is the ability to "strafe" around corners. Keep it turned off.
Second is the TFTD damage formula. Basically original has 0-200% damage spread on shooting weapons, whereas TFTD has 50-150%. And while minimum of 50% may sound like it makes the game harder (because unarmored rookies don't survive by pure luck), it is really the upper boundary, which is problematic. With 150% max damage the aliens can barely do any damage to you in power armor facing their direction. I would appreciate having 50-200% roll, or double 0-100% roll... which seem the most fair to me... but since we don't have them, take the 0-200% roll (not the 50-150% roll).
Summary: Every soldier has a right to die.
PS: Lastly, everyone who played this game at least 2-3 times knows that 10 random soldiers in power armour with heavy plasmas on autofire can win any non-Ethereal mission. For proof look at BattleBunny's latest LP (first part of it).
Therefore, although I recommend not to use any new fancy OpenXcom options, I do STRONGLY recommend turning on this non-standard option called "UFO extender accuracy"... I honestly can't imagine playing without it anymore. Btw. if you're wondering why is it in this section... it allows the soldiers to miss, which decreases their life expectancy. Also, without it, you have almost no reason to use aimed shots.
---
4. Abuse of explosives... I hope it's not a surprise for you, if I tell you that explosives (grenades, rocket launchers, etc.) are the most powerful weapons in the game. Lots of damage, accurate throwing, small weight, bad resistances of aliens, throwing possible even from cover, grenade relay.... and many more reasons.
Now, I am not telling you to stop using explosives... but at least don't make them even more powerful than they are supposed to be.
There are several settings in OpenXcom, which transform explosives from the best weapon in the game into game-breaking uber-weapons:
- instant grenades - keep turned off
- pre-primed grenades - keep turned off (even for non-lethal, such as smokes)
- explosion height - keep at 0 (zero)
Already one of these settings breaks the game (IMO), all three are just ridiculous.
Summary: Not everything that looks cool is really cool.
---
5. Abuse of AI... AI is stupid! If AI was not stupid, you would lose every time. Since AI is stupid already, don't take too much advantage of its stupidity.
Again, there are dozens of examples, but I will name only a single one, which is ABUSED most frequently:
When you land with a loud Skyranger, common sense tells you that all nearby aliens would be waiting for you to stick your head out of the craft and shoot you in the face (or if you throw a smoke first, shoot blindly at you... which unfortunately AI is too stupid to do). And they do!! All aliens start with full time units on turn 1 and on Superhuman difficulty they are even all turned towards you. That was a conscious game design decision. Please read the last sentence once more. If you didn't read that sentence again, please return back and really read it one more time! Thank you.
If you skip action on the first turn, aliens (driven by the stupid AI) will start running around "aimlessly" (or killing civilians in terror missions) and spend their time units, making it a LOT easier for you in the second turn... effectively losing the combat advantage the game designers have given them. And this will increase your soldier's life expectancy, which will lead to more supersoldiers... and same old story again...
I personally would even re-classify this exploit from cheesy to cheaty... but I will leave it up to you.
Summary: Don't just wait on turn 1! Fight and look for cover...
---
Final summary:
- don't confuse the words "longer" and "harder"
- don't reload
- don't abuse any tactics, which lead to easy victory (whatever that may be for you)
- EDIT (thanks NeptunesNookGames): don't wait until it's day... always take off immediately and play night missions too
Cheers,
Meridian
Disclaimer: Everything above is just my opinion, not scientifically proven facts... you are allowed to disagree... I don't mind if you do, I don't care either.
several people have asked me what do I do to make the game more challenging, i.e. harder.
What mods, settings, rules, etc.
To answer all such questions at once, I decided to make this post.
I will ignore mods completely and talk only about vanilla OpenXcom... but similar principles apply to most (if not all) mods as well.
---
So, first of all, to make the game harder, you have to eliminate (or dumb down) things that make it too easy.
Let me illustrate this key point/idea on something I've seen on IRC yesterday:
"07:49 every tactic is appropriate in winning"
That is true, if you are fighting a real war (actually since humanity developed wartime conduct, even this is not true anymore), but in a computer game this has severe consequences.
If every tactic is allowed, then I can just use a squad full of super-psi-soldiers and win every mission without ever leaving the Skyranger. If you want a proof, look at BattleBunny's latest LP (second half of it).
Summary: You need to limit the use of tactics and game mechanics that make the game too easy.
Spoiler:
---
Now, when we know we need to set some rules, let's discuss what can we do.
The game is basically divided into two parts: geoscape and battlescape.
In geoscape, there is very little potential to make the game truly harder (and a lot of potential to just make it annoying instead).
First option would be to make the dogfights harder (e.g. attack with one interceptor only; or use inferior weapons only, etc.). But since the game can be won without ever shooting down any UFO (for proof see my Hawaii challenge LP), this is of little importance.
Second option would be to make economy-based constraints with implications such as more expensive staff, craft and equipment; longer research, etc. And that might seem like a perfect way to make the game harder.... until you realize that it doesn't make the game "harder" in any way... it just makes the game *longer*. Oh and btw. it is possible to win the game with starting tech (plus Cydonia-or-Bust and Avenger), you don't need better weapons, you don't need any armour (although it looks funny to walk on Mars without helmets), you don't need experienced soldiers... you can win with a bunch of rookies carrying rocket launchers, heavy cannons, HE packs and flares (I would give you a proof but I don't remember who did it on camera).
So, what's left are rules for battlescape...
Summary: If you want to make the game longer, download one of many mods, which make the tech tree more complicated and/or economy more tight (Solarius' FMP, Hobbes' Redux, Hellrazor's Hardmode, etc.). If you want to make the game harder... continue reading.
---
Now we know we need to set some rules for the battlescape to eliminate the "cheesy" (sometimes even "cheaty") stuff.
So, what is cheesy?
What makes the game "not challenging" anymore?
If you want a text book example check out Ivan Dogovich's "Up Close and Personal" mod.
There is a weapon called "Advanced Flash Bang"... a super-effective stun grenade, which doesn't give aliens any chance of success whatssoever (especially with instant grenades option turned on).
That's cheesy.
I know that everybody will have a different view on what is cheesy in vanilla, so I will name only things, which I believe most of us can agree on. Eliminating those should cover 90% of cheesiness in the game.
Cheaty:
1. Reloading
Cheesy:
2. Abuse of psionics
3. Supersoldiers
4. Abuse of explosives
5. Abuse of AI
Summary: Don't worry, I will go into details. Please continue reading.
---
1. Reloading... is sometimes necessary, especially if you are playing with mods that are not 100% stable yet. But in most cases, autosave is enough.
Not reloading is the single most effective way of making the game harder. For those who don't have a strong enough will (98% of us), turn on the Ironman mode, to escape temptation.
Your best soldier dying is part of the game. Your most favourite soldier dying is part of the game. You making a stupid mistake is part of the game. You making a misclick is part of the game. Everything else (expect for game crashes) is part of the game!
Btw. this option almost entirely eliminates also issue #3 (supersoldiers)... more about that later.
Summary: DON'T RELOAD! If you can't resist, play with Ironman mode on. If you rage quit on Ironman, go play with Barbie instead.
PS: as a funny fact, if you decide to allow reload anyway (I don't blame you)... consider turning save scumming ON. Basically both options are cheesy, but here's my explanation why:
- With save scumming OFF - every time you reload, everything will be the same... so you can reload until you develop a perfect recipe for the problem at hand.
- With save scumming ON - every time you reload, everything will be different... so your original problem will disappear... but at least it may be replaced by a different, maybe even harder problem
---
2. Abuse of psionics... as I mentioned before, you can win every mission by having a handful of psi-freaks while hardly moving from the safety of the skyranger.
I will not give you any specific advice here, one man's meat is another man's poison... so decide for yourselves, what do you want to do about it.
For inspiration: I am taking no more than 2-3 psi-amps on any given mission. And even then I am using mind control "with care".
Summary: Give aliens a chance ffs... you'll enjoy the game more, trust me!
---
3. Supersoldiers... are soldiers, which have survived 20+ missions and their stats have increased significantly (e.g. strength = 60+, firing accuracy = 90+, psi skill = 60+, etc.)
With several of these, you can run around with rocket launcher, three rockets, heavy plasma, five alien grenades, medi-kit and psi-amp... while every shot will be a hit, every throw a kill and every mind control a success. A lot of fun, if you're playing for the first time... afterwards... not so much.
If you follow the above and below recommendations (i.e. don't reload and don't abuse), such soldiers should not exist!
Soldiers have a life expectancy between 1 and 20 missions. Supersoldiers break the balance of the game. "Allow them to die" for the planet, with honour.
You can get supersoldiers in an even cheesier way than honest battle experience (honest only on their side of course, mostly abusive on your side).
You can (ab)use active "training", for example mind control and disarm a muton, and shoot at him at point blank range until you're out of bullets in your pistol; or even better put him in a circle of soldiers and let them reaction fire and train reactions too. Or mind control him many times to improve psi skills.
Does this feel right? Don't answer, it was just a rhetorical question...
Furthermore, there are several settings in OpenXcom, which can also increase your soldier's life expectancy a lot and I recommend to turn them off.
First is the "alternate movement methods"... being able to "run" for cover is a life saver; so is the ability to "strafe" around corners. Keep it turned off.
Second is the TFTD damage formula. Basically original has 0-200% damage spread on shooting weapons, whereas TFTD has 50-150%. And while minimum of 50% may sound like it makes the game harder (because unarmored rookies don't survive by pure luck), it is really the upper boundary, which is problematic. With 150% max damage the aliens can barely do any damage to you in power armor facing their direction. I would appreciate having 50-200% roll, or double 0-100% roll... which seem the most fair to me... but since we don't have them, take the 0-200% roll (not the 50-150% roll).
Summary: Every soldier has a right to die.
PS: Lastly, everyone who played this game at least 2-3 times knows that 10 random soldiers in power armour with heavy plasmas on autofire can win any non-Ethereal mission. For proof look at BattleBunny's latest LP (first part of it).
Therefore, although I recommend not to use any new fancy OpenXcom options, I do STRONGLY recommend turning on this non-standard option called "UFO extender accuracy"... I honestly can't imagine playing without it anymore. Btw. if you're wondering why is it in this section... it allows the soldiers to miss, which decreases their life expectancy. Also, without it, you have almost no reason to use aimed shots.
---
4. Abuse of explosives... I hope it's not a surprise for you, if I tell you that explosives (grenades, rocket launchers, etc.) are the most powerful weapons in the game. Lots of damage, accurate throwing, small weight, bad resistances of aliens, throwing possible even from cover, grenade relay.... and many more reasons.
Now, I am not telling you to stop using explosives... but at least don't make them even more powerful than they are supposed to be.
There are several settings in OpenXcom, which transform explosives from the best weapon in the game into game-breaking uber-weapons:
- instant grenades - keep turned off
- pre-primed grenades - keep turned off (even for non-lethal, such as smokes)
- explosion height - keep at 0 (zero)
Already one of these settings breaks the game (IMO), all three are just ridiculous.
Summary: Not everything that looks cool is really cool.
---
5. Abuse of AI... AI is stupid! If AI was not stupid, you would lose every time. Since AI is stupid already, don't take too much advantage of its stupidity.
Again, there are dozens of examples, but I will name only a single one, which is ABUSED most frequently:
When you land with a loud Skyranger, common sense tells you that all nearby aliens would be waiting for you to stick your head out of the craft and shoot you in the face (or if you throw a smoke first, shoot blindly at you... which unfortunately AI is too stupid to do). And they do!! All aliens start with full time units on turn 1 and on Superhuman difficulty they are even all turned towards you. That was a conscious game design decision. Please read the last sentence once more. If you didn't read that sentence again, please return back and really read it one more time! Thank you.
If you skip action on the first turn, aliens (driven by the stupid AI) will start running around "aimlessly" (or killing civilians in terror missions) and spend their time units, making it a LOT easier for you in the second turn... effectively losing the combat advantage the game designers have given them. And this will increase your soldier's life expectancy, which will lead to more supersoldiers... and same old story again...
I personally would even re-classify this exploit from cheesy to cheaty... but I will leave it up to you.
Summary: Don't just wait on turn 1! Fight and look for cover...
---
Final summary:
- don't confuse the words "longer" and "harder"
- don't reload
- don't abuse any tactics, which lead to easy victory (whatever that may be for you)
- EDIT (thanks NeptunesNookGames): don't wait until it's day... always take off immediately and play night missions too
Cheers,
Meridian
Disclaimer: Everything above is just my opinion, not scientifically proven facts... you are allowed to disagree... I don't mind if you do, I don't care either.
8698
Playthroughs / Re: Let's play OpenXcom (Final Mod Pack)
« on: July 14, 2015, 10:52:45 am »
Hello fellow meatshields,
I will take a break from recording for 5-6 weeks in August and September.
Don't panic, I will record enough episodes upfront and schedule them, so that you can get your bi-daily dose. However, I won't be able to consider your comments, wishes and useful insight during that time... so if you have anything you would like me to do, if you would like to enlist or transfer to a different base or just have some special wish... now is the time to say it.
Currently the last recorded episode is #75.
On this (18+19.7.) and next (25+26.7.) weekend, I will pre-record until episode #96.
Cheers,
Meridian
I will take a break from recording for 5-6 weeks in August and September.
Don't panic, I will record enough episodes upfront and schedule them, so that you can get your bi-daily dose. However, I won't be able to consider your comments, wishes and useful insight during that time... so if you have anything you would like me to do, if you would like to enlist or transfer to a different base or just have some special wish... now is the time to say it.
Currently the last recorded episode is #75.
On this (18+19.7.) and next (25+26.7.) weekend, I will pre-record until episode #96.
Cheers,
Meridian
8699
Suggestions / Re: Zaibakk's Psionics Rules
« on: July 09, 2015, 02:17:21 pm »
1. This is too much in my opinion... I'd say you should be allowed to train psi skill for max. 5 soldiers and take max. 1-2 of them on a mission.
If you are using the mod that allows you to use psi amps only when you effectively see the enemy, I would double the numbers (i.e. max. 10 in training and max. 2-4 on a mission).
Alternatively, you can mod the maximum possible for psi skill improvement to let's say 30 or 35... this should have a similar effect.
2. By the time you can research Mind Probe in FMP, it is almost obsolete... unless you're lucky and can research it early. Not to mention that different classes (e.g. Engineers) in FMP are even visually different... making Mind Probe completely redundant/useless in most cases.
In vanilla game, it makes more sense to make such a restriction.
3. Psionic soldier requirement is OK.
Waypoints equal to Psi Skill / 10 is OK.
I don't like the requirements for having things in your backpack (maybe replace those with minimum psi strength, e.g. 70+)
The reason why I don't agree with stuff in backpack is that you will require supersoldiers with strength 50/60+ (with 20+ missions and real battle experience from each of these missions). You can do that only by reloading when a supersoldier candidate dies (which is basically cheating, and first thing you should not do, to make the game harder) or very late in the game, when you have best armor, best weapons and these restrictions are pointless anyway (you should just go to cydonia, finish the game and start a new one).
4. 1 is not enough. At least 3-4... otherwise you can really use a missile launcher instead.
If you are using the mod that allows you to use psi amps only when you effectively see the enemy, I would double the numbers (i.e. max. 10 in training and max. 2-4 on a mission).
Alternatively, you can mod the maximum possible for psi skill improvement to let's say 30 or 35... this should have a similar effect.
2. By the time you can research Mind Probe in FMP, it is almost obsolete... unless you're lucky and can research it early. Not to mention that different classes (e.g. Engineers) in FMP are even visually different... making Mind Probe completely redundant/useless in most cases.
In vanilla game, it makes more sense to make such a restriction.
3. Psionic soldier requirement is OK.
Waypoints equal to Psi Skill / 10 is OK.
I don't like the requirements for having things in your backpack (maybe replace those with minimum psi strength, e.g. 70+)
The reason why I don't agree with stuff in backpack is that you will require supersoldiers with strength 50/60+ (with 20+ missions and real battle experience from each of these missions). You can do that only by reloading when a supersoldier candidate dies (which is basically cheating, and first thing you should not do, to make the game harder) or very late in the game, when you have best armor, best weapons and these restrictions are pointless anyway (you should just go to cydonia, finish the game and start a new one).
4. 1 is not enough. At least 3-4... otherwise you can really use a missile launcher instead.
8700
Open Feedback / Re: Help for the new guy?
« on: July 08, 2015, 04:24:00 pm »Then what does »full display« mean? The game uses the full display, anyways, when played in full screen. So what does it stand for?
It's not very easy to describe, but I will try.
First of all there are 2 basic modes:
1. first mode is "stretch to fit", i.e. stretch the original image (320x200) to fit the openxcom resolution (that's why it works well only with 16:10 aspect ratios... on other aspect ratios it has black bars on the sides)
2. second mode is "zoom to fill", i.e. zoom in and the rest of the display is filled with solid color (e.g. black for dialog windows, blue for geoscape controls, etc.) -- there's more magic going on with the globe itself and in the battlescape, but you have asked only about menus/dialogs
The first mode is represented by options: Original, 1.5x Original and 2x Original
The second mode is represented by options: Full display, 1/2 display and 1/3 display
Your question was only about "full display", so let's forget the first mode completely and talk only about second mode.
For menus and dialogs, the original (320x200) is zoomed:
- "full display" = no zoom
- "1/2 display" = 2x zoom
- "1/3 display" = 3x zoom
and the rest is filled with solid color.
Therefore I would not recommend "full display" to anyone (only use I found so far is to make screenshot of the entire battlescape at once).
"1/2 display" is nice if you play on lower resolutions, especially if the ratio is other than 16:10 (for example 854x480).
"1/3 display" is nice if you play on medium resolutions (for example 1280x720)
On high 16:10 resolutions (e.g. 1680x1050, 1920x1200), I would probably recommend the first mode (stretch to fit, for example 2x Original).
On high non 16:10 resolutions (e.g. 1920x1080), you will either have to live with black bars on sides... or as I said in the previous post, play in a window instead at lower resolution (I found 1280x720 to be the best for me so far).