Messages

1

XPiratez / Re: [MOD] Delayed Ninja Base Spawns

« on: April 19, 2022, 06:58:37 pm »

Definitely going to be using this, thanks for making it. Totally agree about the ninjas currently creating that feeling of reluctance to play.

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The X-Com Files / Re: [POLL] Commendations: hidden or not?

« on: September 24, 2019, 10:24:01 pm »

Amazing idea, and you seem to already have the follow-through sensibly worked out (that the bonuses don't count against the stat-cap, for example).

Third option definitely seems best to me. Have most of the 'basic' ones' articles visible from the start - things like Night Owl, Stormtrooper, Ice Cold Killer, whatever you get for being shot at/hit a lot - and keep some of the higher end, or niche/surprising ones hidden until achieved. So the player already knows they'll get a reward of sorts for one guy killing two or three targets in one turn, but it's left for them to discover if there's a special reward for killing say, six in one turn. Or so they can come across things like 'Traitor'/'Turncoat' (I forget the name, the one where you accidentally kill a teammate) on their own. Which raises its own questions as to whether that would grant a bonus or a malus...

Anyway, great addition, I'm getting so impatient waiting for 1.0 now! The whole lower caps, more bonuses thing sounds like a great antidote to the grindiness that was previously a bit much in the early campaign, so yeah. Can't wait to play it!

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The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 0.9.9e2: Summertime Lovin'

« on: August 05, 2019, 10:51:26 pm »

Though the term does throw up an obvious suggestion for an addition to the hunts (a few more types to lessen the number of beetle/rat/scorpion ones can never hurt) - Graboids!

I mean, obviously, good luck to the poor guy who has to sprite those things, but it'd certainly be awesome to see those start popping up in desert environments.

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The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 0.9.9d: Samael's Passage

« on: August 03, 2019, 01:07:58 am »

The exception is any hunt where you're within melee range. Hunts are just training missions where you spamfire from the van until you're in the slightest bit of danger then immediately abort. I really don't like them at all.

I know what you mean. It's fun doing them all for the first time, and that moment where you go from 'Aah, this is too scary' to 'Wait, I can handle this' is always cool, but yeah, it doesn't take long at all for the hunts to start to feel like a chore.

Actually, on the subject, which are the missions that I definitely shouldn't skip/abort, in terms of points? I'm always worried about running into trouble through accruing a negative score due to not doing them.

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The X-Com Files / Re: Bugs, crashes, typos & bad taste

« on: May 04, 2019, 05:17:52 pm »

Enforcement of storage limits is disabled by default (for this mod that is, you can enable it in the options). I don't know why, honestly. I always felt that dealing with limited storage space is one of the things that made the mod interesting, especially if you have to choose and manage your interrogation priorities.

Thank you, good to know.

For my part, I'll keep it disabled. For one thing, a lot of space is already being taken up by the extra hangers this mod requires, which limits space for extra storage. Combined with both the larger amounts of fluff research (which seems to be sprinkled in with rarely-found valuable research? I'm sure I got a couple of missions from dossiers on particular people, so you can't just ignore it) and the apparent possibility of losing the chance to capture certain enemies after doing things like putting an end to the various cults, it seems like prisoner management would soon become aggravating.

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The X-Com Files / Re: Bugs, crashes, typos & bad taste

« on: May 04, 2019, 07:50:39 am »

I completely forgot about this until I saw an off-hand mention of prison space on another thread, but... is it intentional that your prisons never get filled? I captured a whole bunch of enemies on my previous playthrough, dozens and dozens, and never got any prisoner management screen or anything like that. When I checked the prison it showed I had negative space, but I never had to do anything about it.

I think at the time I assumed it must be intentional because of how the interrogating live prisoners thing is bloated by all the dossiers, but I figured it was worth checking.

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The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 0.9.8: X-Cool

« on: April 21, 2019, 03:11:28 am »

Does anyone have any tips for effective use of melee tactics? Based on Sol's previous reply (and things others have said in this thread previously) it sounds like it can be strong, but whenever I've gone that way it always ends up being 'Run toward the enemy - get wounded in a hail of reaction fire - half my guys miss their targets and wind up standing in front of them, bleeding - other half kill their targets but are left out in the open - everybody dies when the enemy takes their turn'.

Obviously, I get that it's not appropriate to every situation (you can't charge across a wide open field to stab someone on the other side of the map) but short of indoor missions like the Black Lotus party I can't really make effective use of it. Are you waiting until you have strong protection like cyber armour, or are you using your rookies as expendable kamikazes? Maybe I just need to use more smoke grenades.

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The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 0.9.8: X-Cool

« on: April 19, 2019, 02:10:35 pm »

1. Sometimes in outpost missions enemies can start with like ten enemies staring right into your face on your first turn (especially fun when you have couple of exalt agents with grenade launchers), ready to blast the entire mag at once the second you do anything, you have no chance of survival even with a smoke and killing as much enemies as possible on your turn with grenades or whatever, until later on when you can afford tanking all of the damage with armor.

Yeah - I don't think it's any change this mod makes (though it's exacerbated by the larger numbers of enemies), but it does feel like the random placement/facing of enemies at the start can make a huge difference - bigger than the number of enemies, or their types/weapons. Which leads to a lot of missions where you land and then just end up aborting on turn 1. Again, not the fault of this mod, but it'd be nice to tone down that RNG aspect without losing replayability if it were possible to do so. Fighting at night might ameliorate this somewhat?

2. On jungle maps, various plants can block your path around the spawn vehicle and it's not easy to break them, I also had a cult hideout mission with the building placed in the corner of the map with a lake in front of it and the only tiny path it had to it was blocked by plants again, so enemy melee fighters had no chance of getting to me, but so did I. I didn't have fire at the time too. Is it possible to use machete to cut them down?

Not really related but last time I played XPiratez, to get the last Academy Researcher or whatever it was on some night mission on a lake map I had to stun one of my girls and then throw them over the water so she could wake up, reach the guy and take him out. I wouldn't like to have to do it often, but it was actually pretty funny at the time.

3. I guess you're not meant to tackle some missions very early on your first year, but I generally did well with everything game was throwing at me, even the early reaper mission with two reapers while I only had pistols and shotguns (captured them both, had a good map where I could shoot them without getting smacked using bait&switch tactics and the fact that they're too fat and couldn't fit between the trees and small lakes), but the only legit mission I had to abort because of how bullshit it was, was the bullfrog infestation mission. The map had like ten of them and they all had insane reaction fire and shoot three-four times a turn across the map with lethal precision, with each of their projectiles instantly knocking you out and burning your TU if you manage to withstand, and I had absolutely no means of dealing with them at that time, I couldn't even kill one with everything I got (reaper-tier health and defenses too?!).

Yeah, those frogs are crazy. I only ever seem to encounter them in huge hordes when they seem like they'd be better like the Fenris Wolf, just one or two on a map. Last time I attempted 'em (with my Promotion III guys) I barely managed to kill one in the first turn, then had to abandon the mission before the remaining dozen turned around and tongued me to death.

5. At one point when I was in a pinch I accidentally activated incendiary grenade instead of smoke and burned my entire squad. May I suggest changing incendiary sprite a little to make it more distinct? It looks too similar to a smoke right now.

Hah, I keep mistaking those two as well. Haven't burned up my guys yet but I have made a few mistakes in the loadout screen because of it.

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The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 0.9.8: X-Cool

« on: April 08, 2019, 11:50:19 pm »

Adding 'yet another hangar' would probably be less of an issue if we had different craft/hangar sizes. As far as i can tell this is actually on the feature roadmap for OXCE and it would probably play nicely with all the cars X-Com Files has. Using a whole hangar for a Van or a Porsche just doesn't feel right. What we need is a carpark. It would free up three (or four, if you have more than one) additional base tiles per ground craft, if you allow multiple cars per carpark.

Do most people have multiple cars at the point they're doing advanced underwater missions, though?

For my part I ditched all my cars/vans as soon as I reached Promotion III. I had to give up on a few missions that needed civilian transportation, unfortunately (like League of Concerned Citizens ones), but I just didn't have the space for another hanger. And juggling my capable agents between my spare bases wasn't really viable, as the transfers take so long the missions disappear. The smart thing to do would probably be to send teams out from different bases right from the early game, training up agents at two or three bases at once, but it seems like that would double or triple the time needed to reach the same point of capableness.

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The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 0.9.8: X-Cool

« on: April 04, 2019, 02:45:20 am »

Commits suicide

See, it's easy to do by mistake, isn't it?

Seriously though, you're doing a great job on the mod and I hope I didn't imply otherwise. I look forward to seeing how it continues to develop, whether anything I said above is implemented or not.

Psionics should be nominally unknown and scary in my opinion.

I agree to a degree - I certainly wouldn't telegraph which enemies have what attacks, and there's no need to go into the precise formulas - but I'd at least warn people how it can be. I can only imagine how pissed a player would feel if they had some guy with a loaded rocket launcher - who they assumed was safely out of sight of the aliens at the back of the landing craft - mind controlled into blowing up half his squad just because they sent out a couple of scouts on the first turn.

My perspective is probably coloured by the fact that I play Ironman, which I've been assuming is the norm. Reloading obviously ameliorates issues like that immensely.

The gym is very very good already; I agree on the mission grindiness though. It's my own fault to a point, I needed the cash so badly I couldn't skip a single cryptid hunt.

Yeah, the gym is good. I certainly didn't mean to imply otherwise. It just seems like an easy way to solve the grindiness issue without introducing other unintended consequences.

Night missions are valid and useful in this mod. In fact I get utterly ruined everytime I try day missions against human enemies in the early game.
Press 'l' to switch off the personal lights. The lights on the craft are actually flashlights lying on the ground. Don't bring flashlights! Flashlights are a death trap! Bring a dog and some E-lights and stick to the black squares. A few enemies will shoot at you from across the map for no discernible reason even when you've gone perfectly dark but they usually miss.

Aha! I was aware of 'l', but it was the flashlights. I was bringing a bunch (for no real reason). Thanks for clearing that up, I look forward to doing some sneaky night missions in my new campaign.

I agree on the Magnums.
Rifles are useful, especially precision ones. The only "real life" SMG I ended up using was the MAC10 for 16 fucking shots per turn. the best "real life" machine gun is the M60, being useful at rifle range and reaction fire, the others have a pitiful effective range. It would be nice if more MGs had Snap Shot(x2) or (x3).
All the Black Ops machine guns and miniguns are hella sweet though.

Which rifles would you say are worth using? I found the Nitro Express and Hunting Rifle decent before I got magnums, and later it was worth keeeping a couple of Arasakas on my guys for those really long-distance shots (on the 120+ Firing Accuracy guys, obviously), but for everything else the magnums were top-tier. Particularly with tritanium ammo, which tied up my engineers but was otherwise pretty cheap to produce.

Anyway, thanks for reading all that. And being able to do night missions without starting Turn 1 in a self-created spotlight will probably do wonders for my next campaign!

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The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 0.9.8: X-Cool

« on: April 03, 2019, 05:33:33 am »

Maybe it was before I set that? Or something is just wrong. Please tell me it's not wrong.

After reading this thread a little more closely, I think I might have hit the self-destruct button when trying to minimize the intercept window. I wanted to quickly minimize and see if I could get another craft up in the air to come help, but I didn't realise the minimize button had turned into self-destruct. I suppose the fact that it was red should have been a clue, but I was already panicking about being attacked.

Well, almost no "tutorial" is hidden behind research, except some psionic stuff. I can add more articles, but it's never easy to recognize what is unclear.

Here's a few things I think would benefit from being detailed in articles:

The fact that dogs and AIs can improve their stats, and some tips for when they're best used.
Whether melee attacks are more effective from the back here. I don't mean in terms of armour, I mean in terms of chance to hit. Piratez had evasion, but I see that doesn't apply to melee here, so does it matter what direction you poke someone from?
How the whole 'Aliens intercepting you' thing works (and recovering crashed guys, if that's a thing). Mention self-destruct!
How alien psionics work, particularly vis a vis enemy sight - is the thing where if they see one of your guys, they can control any of your guys still a thing? Do they still focus on the weakest guy (which is pretty exploitable)?
Something telling the player to enable alternate movement methods (running helps so much in the earlygame). Or just make it default.
(Possibly) Some vague guidance on things that are tricky and might trip new players' up. 'It's worth bringing a few heavy melee weapons along with you on most missions - they can penetrate armour where small arms would fail'. Or, after discovering the Psi strength of your soldiers, something like 'Be careful about who you bring on missions against enemy psionics! Soldiers below XX Psionic Strength are likely to be exceptionally vulnerable to alien psionic attacks'. And 'Don't leave the Skyranger on the first turn! The aliens all start with full TUs...', etc etc.
(Possibly) Some hinting toward which missions are fine to skip and which will greatly damage your score.

Some of the above seems obvious, perhaps, but for my part at least I've recommended this mod (and Piratez) to people who barely played the original XCOM. Rather than have them poring over a Ufopaedia article laying out exactly how Psi Strength influences their defence, it seems simpler to just have a succinct explanation of what they need to know placed in the mod, accessed through research.

You can't really go wrong with providing more information to people in my opinion. And people pay more attention to a cheap and interestingly-titled research topic than they would to a readme.

Other random feedback:

The game is good fun, and I love the working your way up from humble beginnings aspect. However, too much of the earlygame becomes a slow grind - there's only so many times you can have a bunch of new agents standing in a square and reaction-firing at a wide open field full of scorpions and giant rats before it gets painful. I'd suggest buffing the gym to work faster and take agents to a higher level, and potentially nerfing a couple of the more bullshit 'death from nowhere' things, like Lotus Assassins. I've heard people say that the grindiness is something that's still being worked on though, which is good to hear.

I was surprised, given the Piratez influence, that night ops are so harshly punished here. It was great fun in that mod sneaking around and taking out unsuspecting Academy guys, even if it was a little OP in the earlygame. Here it seems borderline suicidal, at least in the first couple of years. Is there at least a way to turn off the lights on the car/van/craft/whatever you came in? They're doing my agents absolutely no favours.

Weapon balance could use some work. Magnums are too accurate, and there seems little incentive to use rifles and machine guns instead. From something like month 6 to month 30, the vast majority of my squad went from using magnums, to black ops magnums, and eventually smart magnums. A couple of them had Arasaka 3000's, and one had a Milkor (eventually upgraded to a rocket launcher) but aside from undercover missions there rarely seemed an incentive to use anything else.

I was a little unclear on what things could be 'Lost Forever'. Like, the staff of Dagon and Heartgrip staffs - would I lose all opportunities to get more of those after I elimated the Church of Dagon? And the missions that come up saying 'You'll only get one chance at this', like the Lo Wo mission - will it only appear the once, or does it just mean I can only attempt it once, but I can leave it for now and it'll repop in a couple of months? Not a big deal, but worth clarifying if possible.

Anyway, thanks for all your hard work on the mod. It's a lot of fun, and one day, when someone combines it with XPiratez and then remakes the whole thing in the Jagged Alliance 2 engine, we'll have achieved gaming perfection

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The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 0.9.8: X-Cool

« on: April 02, 2019, 11:45:30 pm »

Does that apply on purely passenger craft like the Skyranger? My first real campaign just came to an end because an alien intercepted my course and blew it out of the sky, killing everyone on board. I'm assuming I wasn't just ridiculously unlucky and failed the 97% chance test 12 times?

Also, is there any kind of warning within the mod for the fact that this can occur? It was a nasty shock, and I'm a little surprised given the Piratez influence that more of the ingame mechanics and threats aren't elaborated on through the research. It's cool that a couple of the dossiers unlock missions, but most of them seem largely useless, and the explanation of things like Camo, Stun recovery, etc, that Piratez offered would probably be more help to people who are going in unspoiled. Particularly with stuff added just in this mod, like the interceptions.