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Topics - mumble

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1
OXCE Suggestions Archive / [Suggestion] Weapon range influenced by stats
« on: February 25, 2019, 01:01:06 am »
Namely, this could be used for "thrown" weapons. Allowing strength or throwing to play into max range, instead of having a locked range which is either too high for weaklings, realistically speaking, or too low for big guys. You could also make guns more refined, adding additional range to snap or aimed shot based on aim before fall off.

2
Currently, missions with "civilians" can be a little odd, if the mission is meant specifically for protecting someone, as the ai leaves things to be desired in terms of following orders. This makes sense for civilians in a terror mission, but doesn't work for more select missions.

I was wondering about, if you are for instance protecting a vip, if you could instead of having civilian ai, have a xcom unit assigned just for that map, that you control like troops, but are still in charge of protecting. Could work well for extraction missions, or protecting a vip a lot better than randomly running around. Especially if they are treated as a civilian if they live or die, as "loot" or something, and add some variety. Especially if a mission it was critical to rescue a vip, and the rest of the force was expendable.

But such missions would require the map giving you such a unit on arrival.

3
I can see an incredibly interesting way to make maps more interesting in the game, but it would require scripting and a decent amount of code, but could be very rewarding. The idea is to have the ability, mid match to edit map sectors beyond just blowing stuff up.

I have 2 ideas for this, one is inventory usage, placing a "tile" or wall, via inventory. The implication of this could mean deployable step ladders as a medium between walking everywhere, and flying deployable barricades, ect. There would obviously need to be extra code for enemies to destroy barricades, but I'm speaking about the long term implications of such a script.

The other is allowing "switches" that work similarly to doors, right clicking to open, which activate something on the map. Lights, locked doors, explosives, and possibly more.

With the ability to script this, I could see step ladders as deployable equipment, light switches inside buildings, secret doorways in bases ect.

I realize this would be a lot of code, but I can't help but think it could add plenty.

4
I dont think this is currently added, but what if certain classes or armors had certain checks with equipment for usage? Maybe certain classes or races can only utilize certain equipment, forcing you to use them, or certain weapons required certain armors to use, or just faced nerfs if used off the optimal armor (like a smart gun which requires integration with cyber armor to be used to full effect, or a psi item which can only be used by certain races).


I could see this making a psudo class system a bit more possible, as currently it seems items only have stat checks, or armor integrated weapons, but what if this system could make things better than current means? I think this simple change would add lots of modding potential.

Certain psi abilities locked per class, certain guns better with certain units, stats aside, and armors being necessary for some equipment.

I think its relatively small, giving the ability for armors and classes to have tags for (item type specialty) and giving items either a hard lock (cannot use if not specialized) or soft lock (can use, but nerfs to aim, damage, or whatever other scripts)

Could even classes / armor a soft / hard lock per equipment, so maybe most classes cannot use something, some can use it in effectively, and others can use it as its intended.

5
The X-Com Files / Medicals balance
« on: October 28, 2018, 06:22:27 am »
So I had a thought recently about the medical bag. It seems a little redundant to me, but I only really understood why recently.

Currently, it has 1 of each heal, stims and pain killers (though its important to note pain killers seem less useful) in the bag, weighs 5 units, and is 2x2 blocks.

But honestly, once sprays and stims are available, I don't bother ever again, and the medkit is better in every way EXCEPT weight, afaik. Infact, I never legitimately use the medbag, unless its just lying around.

I'm was trying to figure out what is so bad, and I think I figured out why I don't bother. It's too big. Not too HEAVY, too big, 2x2 is a lot of real estate for 1 heal when a a kit has 3, and trauma pack has 5, and considering pain killers aren't super important (heals, stims, and pain killers seems like the hierarchy of medicine in this) its arguably better to spend an extra 10 weight on a kit, or have a spray and stim to similar effect, 2 less spaces, and only 1 weight more. The extra space invest is nuts for it, so ive been thinking.

Could we reduce the med bag to a 1x2, like pistols? Enable slightly more flexibility, carrying 2 med bags in a belt, a med bag in quick draw, and obviously you can carry 3 on belt / qd, but then the kit is more effective greatly.

I CAN actually see myself using the medical bag this way, as a small gear on troops, to augment additional medics, whatever, and I don't think it would make medical bags overpowered, considering 5 is still heavier than spray, and 1x2 is also bigger than spray, but it would make it a little more attractive as an option, rather than feeling like a cheap knock off medkit that barely works for anything.

I'm not sure how you feel on it, but I think this would work better.

6
OXCE Suggestions Archive / [Suggestion] Single load "magazine" mechanic.
« on: October 26, 2018, 07:40:26 am »
So currently shotgun and revolver reloads are a little unrealistic, you must unload a shotgun completely to reload. I was thinking, what if SELECT types of magazines (lever actions, pump actions, cylinder loading guns, ect) Loaded one round at a time? Perhaps keep for instance, a standard 6 shell shotgun have the same ammo, but instead of reloading all 6 for a huge cost, enable loading just 1 for a smaller cost, like 7 - 10 tus?

This would enable a few things. First, you could have more unwieldy guns (loading a cylinder grenade launcher slower, but enabling flexibility, juggling shotgun shells to shoot) and possibly, having guns with limited capacity, but larger ammo? (imagine a pellet gun, with a tin of 50 shots, but you load 1 at a time).

Could be interesting for variance, and I don't think would be too difficult.

7
Suggestions / 2 person vaulting.
« on: August 25, 2018, 04:50:02 am »
So one issue in XCOM is that, obstacles are either insurmountable with poor weapons / no flying suit, or semi pointless with enough explosives / flying suits. So I have an idea which Might help.

2 people could be able to work together to have 1 person climb up. 1 person under a ledge (or fence), another climbing.

Flat rate would be 40 tu's and 30 energy to climb up, for both the climber and the helper, but with several modifications. First, the TU's would be compared for both units, and the person with the larger TU pool would use more TU's to be using the same amount of TU's as the slower person, since its a team effort. This would be TU taxing obviously, but would give a huge advantage if you sacrificed the time units. The action would also factor in strength, and more importantly, weight.  The weight of the climbing unit itself, and the equipment it carried, would be tallied up, and then compared to the "open" weight in the other individual. The weight OVER the person helpings capacity, after adding the climbers weight of person and items, would tally against the Tu's and energy used, easily making the action impossible if you are both carrying too much, or using weaklings. Health / stun could also factor in, adding to the difficulty in doing so, so a gutshot helper wouldn't be as effective.

Admittedly I'm not at all sure how this would be possible in the engine, perhaps with a contextual move done with open hands by the helper / open hand of the climber, which moves the unit up 1, and forward 2, if facing each other, or perhaps it just enables a pathway to pathfind if the math works.

....So yeah, not sure how well this could work, BUT, this could be an interesting tactic for vaulting strong walls with a scout, and would provide a nice reason for light units (chuck dogs over a wall?) or to have a heavier unit a bit more moderately loaded up. I could see this especially if snipers are used.

8
Suggestions / Peripheral vision reactions
« on: August 25, 2018, 03:21:49 am »
So I had a thought about vision, and how the cone isn't exactly on point. In reality, we can see things in the corner of vision, but blurry, and particularly movement. My idea is, have a check to allow for peripheral vision (160 degrees, or 180, if thats easier) in  which a check, and calculation is done, for both detection of units, and reaction fire against them.

The check would operate, I imagine, as such : Say a hostile unit enters a friendly units peripheral view. Each square away increases its effective ability to blend in , since movement is harder to detect on smaller things, and things appear smaller further away. Smaller targets get an additional buff for difficulty in detection, while larger units are more easily noticed. So lets say a large 2x2 unit has a "blend" factor of -20, a large -10, medium -5, ect. Just ball parks. Then you also factor in the units camoflage, lighting, and if the target is on fire (a bright light would obviously be noticable). At the end of this you then get a moving units score, for blending in. I suppose you could also factor in melee as a psudo stealth factor for this. and their own reactions perhaps? dont know..

The check for the peripheral viewer, would weigh first, LOS if that would allow them to be seen with normal vision in this direction. If this fails, and they would be invisible in full view with those circumstances, it immediately fails the check. If not, it weighs reactions, and current TU's (tus being the theory that you spot better when still, and still means no TU's used). In the end, if the score is better for the viewer than the attacker, perhaps the unit could be displayed as a black blob moving, similar to "enemy activity" normal observation, but obviously obscuring identity of who. Reaction shot then would weigh the TUS of both units, and if the viewer passed the reaction check, t would incur a reactions shot, with -20% accuracy (for sudden, jerky shot) and 5  energy.

I figure this could make stealth a little more risky, and make flanking attacks a little less deadly to the right units. You, or the ai, would need to min max to make the most of it, but it could potentially save you, or kill you when sneaking up on an aliens side. It would also add an advantage to lighter armors, since helmets would eliminate, or Nerf peripheral vision.

Sorry my math isn't the best for this. My idea is, that, the further away, and more camo you have, the easier you remain un-noticed, while a person with amazing reactions, and full tu's might be able to cover a whole hall alone against invading mooks. small idea, but I still wanted to share it.

9
With several weapons, I often wonder if there might be a way to enable weapons to force a pawn to turn, to move  back, or crouch depending on the damage level, or other factors : like a tazer causing a unit to crouch and turn, a shotgun blast causing a lightweight enemy to be thrown back and crouch, or being hit at all able to occasionally cause the unit to turn their gaze slightly, based on damage, weight of the unit attacked, damage type, and other elements : I figure this would vastly open up tactical abilities for weapons, and certainly if an enemy being tazed ended up dropping to their knees upon taking a decent hit, it would make the weapon a little more powerful

I figure it could be based upon damage, weight, damage through armor, and variables written into the gun of course, but would open up a lot of possibilities for combat.

I realize not all pawns have crouch frames, but the possibilities still sound neat.

10
The X-Com Files / Commendations rework collab input
« on: July 27, 2017, 05:27:13 am »
So commendations will need to be reworked, and I figured after speaking with Solairus that perhaps rewriting flavor text to befit many of these awards might be good. This is just flavor text, and some will be skipped unless there is an issue : feedback, ESPECIALLY from you solair, would be handy in making these work with the lore, as you know the direction of the game better than I.

I'm going to hide these in a spoiler since otherwise it will take up the whole page.

The format I will use is the following

Inspiration : [title, taken from commendations from FMP, as a reference point]

Title : [Title to be used in XCF,  or if it remain the same. This is obviously up for debate, and I will defer to you solair, as I am  AWFUL at picking good sounding titles]

Requirement : [what is necessary to GET the commendations. Solair, PLEASE correct me if I'm mistaken on the limits of these =x]

Text : [Text of the file, as it relates to xcom, the probable time period, tech level, terminology, and other elements that are possible in the time period of the game, and likelihood of it happening. You obviously also can change these, add quote, whatever...or throw it all out if you don't think it fits]

Mini Text : [same as text, but condensed to be viewed when browsing a soldiers medals]

>>INSPIRATION :
>>TITLE :
>>REQUIREMENT
>>TEXT :
>>MINI TEXT :
^^^ this will be the format, just to keep thins easy to read.

I will be going through every commendation in FMP (my copy, slightly outdated) to alter every single one. But don't expect me to get it all done in this first post, I will edit this with time, as this is a LOT of writing obviously.

And a few questions solair : do you want quotes with these things as well? Do you want is explicitely removed from US military terms?  I'm going in a little blind into what you want, but trying anyway.

Spoiler Changed commendations:
>>INSPIRATION : TECHINT
>>TITLE : Cultist Specialist [Or replace specialist with veteran]
>>REQUIREMENT : Capturing unresearched equipment from cults, such as psiclone,  equipment needed to "shut down" cults, or other elements, or capture of high profile enemies such as exalt coordinators. Perhaps 2-3 captures involved in their career would be requirement along a career to make this happen. Does not expressly require THEM taking it, so much as being involved in such missions.
>>TEXT : Investigating and finding clues is critical to our mission of assessing the paranormal threat, and fighting cultists better armed than us is a tall task to take, requiring bravery and skills to do, and still come out with necessary evidence

Agent has participated in investigation of paranormal activities within [Cult] and uncovered extremely valuable information for our activities [Cult], thus earning the honor of this commendation.

Agents whom are involved with the capture of [2-3] high ranking objectives against [cult] are given this award
>>MINI TEXT : Given to an agent involved with important [cult] investigation objectives

==================

>>INSPIRATION : Athena Citation
>>TITLE : Merit of Growth (debatable, I'm sure you are better at titles, or even keep athena citation)
REQUIREMENT : Same as AC, but excluding gym work if possible? Possibly moving the requirement from 10 points to 15, since the game is so long
>>TEXT : Not all agents came into xcom experts or hardened warriors, as we value loyalty over performance due to the nature of our objectives. And the demands of our agents is always growing, as must the agents themselves

This agent has shown dedication to improving ones own skills, growing in ability and skills, demonstrating even with overwhelming odds and limited Intel, we can still make ourselves better via dedication and hard work to face the paranormal threat

This is given to soldiers who improve themselves by 10-15 points. There are 10 levels of this award, at a maximum of improvement of 100-150 points

>>MINI TEXT : Given to an agent who dedicates themselves to improvement

==================

>>INSPIRATION : Infilade Citation
>>TITLE : Flanking expert (or just the same thing)
>>REQUIREMENT : (same, but discluding beasts for obvious reasons, and possibly segregate cultists in general from aliens considering the combat styles are very different for both)
>>TEXT : Despite facing overwhelming odds sometimes, the tactics our agents use can indeed give us the extra edge to obtain victory. Flanking is a tactic we can use in even the more dire situations to effectively defeat our enemies when otherwise overwhelmed.

This agent has displayed an aptitude for neutralizing hostiles from a flanked position before they know they are even there. Such a tactic has the benefit of evading enemy fire, and surprising the enemy.

Citation issued to agents every 3 kills from flanked position, up to 4 times.

>>MINI TEXT : Given to an agent who kills an enemy with a flanking shot

============

>>INSPIRATION : Performance Citation
>>TITLE : Same
>>REQUIREMENT : Same (perhaps segregate into 3 separate ones for "monsters", humans, and aliens, again because combat is very different.)
>>TEXT : "“Great. Now we can shoot at those bastards from every direction.” - Chesty Puller

Despite being outnumbered, an agent can come out ontop with sheer tenacity and skill.

Agents who show tenacity and ability are given this award, for showing they can thin out the enemies faster than enemies can react

This citation is given to agents who eliminate 2 targets in rapid succession, the quicker we eliminate resistance, the quicker we can investigate.

4 levels exist to this award, for agents who are capable of dispatching multiple [monsters / humans / aliens] per turn.

>>MINI TEXT : Given to an agent who kills multiple targets in a single turn.

----------------
Spoiler NEW Commendations:
>>INSPIRATION : Longevity medal / xcom service medal
>>TITLE : Era (1-4) Veteran
>>REQUIREMENT : Spend 3 months in service (or 2 months for promotion 0) in these eras of xcom, so before 1 promotion, but after another (ie, era 1 is before promotion 1, era 2 is after promotion 1, but before promotion 2, ect)
>>TEXT :
>>[promotion 0]
Our birth, as a woefully underfunded, under-equipped, and understaffed agency was certainly a bit rough. We lacked proper equipment, lacked support from the council which created us, and lacked the basic needs required to do the job, but did it anyways.

This agent spent a considerable amount of time within our agency during our first era, and is recognized as a part of significant historical importance to xcom going forward : ones here from the very start, when nothing was certain, except the risk of death, and the council not taking us serious.

Agents who spend 3-2 months in the first era of xcom before promotion 1 are given this.
>>[promotion 1]
Our first expanse, given a little wiggle room in international law and more authority to exercise force. Though still very limited, it allowed us to expand from a 2 bit agency into a substantial force able to take significantly harder objectives than before, and made the council actually listen to us.

This agent spent  a considerable amount of time within our agency during the second era, and is recognized as a key role in our advancement towards a unsure objectives in an unsure future, and facing terrible odds for the sake of our investigation.

Agents who spend 3 months in the second era of xcom before promotion 2 are given this
>>[promotion 2]
Our first taste of power, the expanse of xcom into a more military like entity. We still lacked authority for many things, but we were expanding greatly into advances in our equipment and capabilities, as well as what international law would permit, while we truly began to take control of some situations around the world.

This agent spent a considerable amount of time within our agency during this third era, and is recognized as warriors who faced some of the more unknown and strange paranormal threats, and preparing for an unknown future against an unknown enemy.

Agents who spend 3 months in the third era of xcom before promotion 3 are given this
>>[promotion 3]
The council finally gave us full military authorization, and full circumvention of all international law : an expanse into great power, but with great, responsibility to earth, and seeing some of what the paranormal threat was TRULY capable of, outside the scope of what we originally may have thought.

This agent spent a considerable amount of time within our agency during this, our greatest era, and is recognized for their bravery, skill, and dedication to responding to paranormal issues the likes we have never seen, and to fighting the enemy unknown

>>MINITEXT : Given to an agent who was a veteran of xcoms (1st, 2nd, 3rd, or 4th) era


----------------
Spoiler UNCHANGED Commendations (Or those requiring advice / only need "trooper" changed to "agent"):


----------------
Spoiler Additional flavor text:
>>INSPIRATION : Backstory lore article (written by chief medical officer)
>>TITLE : Commendations
>>REQUIREMENT : Start of game
>>TEXT : Commander, from what I gather the work our agents will be extremely dangerous and taxing on morale : my husband works in metalwork and other crafts, and so I had an idea : perhaps we could have awards for our agents for good performance? It would help with morale, distinguish our agents, and give my husband practice in his art.

Cost? Oh no, don't worry : I wont charge anything you will notice on your books, but I figure this will be well worth keeping our agents motivated, especially when they are at such a risk of being horrifically killed, shot, or eaten by monsters...er...Please don't share that with the agents. We want to IMPROVE morale, not make it worse.
>>MINI TEXT : N/A (its a starting research article explaining the logic behind medals potentially so early.)

Let me know if you have anything to add solair!

I realize almost all of this is subject to change, but I wanted to at least try =)

Sorry if this isn't even particularly useful, but I figure I'd try.  I've posted what few ideas I've gone over, its by no means everything, but to be honest I would appreciate criticism BEFORE I write an entire novels worth of text just to have to change all of it.

This post will be updated regularly with new data, and I will try to date what is indeed changed in a changelog going forward

I suppose others could indeed post in with this if they want, and have creative writing skills, but obviously we will defer to solair when asked, and he has the right to alter any and all text we post.

....sorry if its  not much, but this is a taller task than I thought, and I figure bite sized chunks are better than trying to do them all, especially before I get feedback.

Also, solair, perhaps a github setup might work for this?

Please let me know your thoughts solair.

....Blech, feel like I could of done a better job with this post. Oh well. Its a bit rough but its something.

First posted on 7/26/2017

11
I've often thought about the differences here, all 3 use heat based damage in  a sense, but are treated differently, and I started to think why, and I think I might have an idea on why they perform different despite all being thermal based. This bothered me for a while, as how could these mechanically damage differently if they were JUST thermal energy? So I decided to brainstorm a little.

Incendiary is incredibly indirect, its a large amount of thermal energy without any real specific precision, and damage typically comes from large scale burns rather than incredibly powerful, directed burns, this means its generally unlikely to hurt any TRULY hard targets, but the large encompassing thermal energy could potentially flood any opening points inside the enemy, which explains why say, a cyber-disk might be effected by fire, as the flames and fuel might leak inside, and ignite the internals. Typically its a large, and sloppy ignition of fuel like gasoline or other incendiaries, which burns "hot" but not hot enough to melt anything substantial (usually) while also getting everywhere. However, besides pure thermal energy, there is nothing else to it for the most part.

Lasers are a velocity lacking direct beam of light energy : using a massively powerful beam of light which can burn / melt through many materials, and do more / less damage depending on the width of the beam, the power of the beam, and how heat resistant the material fired at is. However, despite the power, the beams have 0 kenetic energy, so armor which is stunningly heat resistant but fragile would still be viable, while armor with a high tensile strength and flexibility would be less viable if it cannot tolerate and dissipate heat. Besides that theres a possible issue of radiation : much like how sunlight can erode things that heat alone would not damage, there is a good chance of severe radiation particles which could damage tissue, fry electronics, or even cause metal to corrode / spark (like putting a spoon in the microwave) so even if something was entirely thermal resistant, the radiation. As a realworld example, light from welding is incredibly corrosive, and even if the light does not heat things up, having clothing exposed to this light for a significant amount of the time will severely damage it : so hypothetically one could even have a "heatless" laser which was room temperature, but fired intense radiation.

Plasma is like a marriage of kinetic weapons like bullets and thermal energy, firing out accelerated particles with excessive heat also involved. Because of the merge, its typically more effective than laser in most situations as it takes the heat, and mixes with particles, so the light, but heat resistant armor mentioned before would not be viable as the particles could still penetrate them with the high velocity. Theres also the issue of the anti gravity field which I assume could have effects on physics which bring in unforeseen issues with armor. However, the heat is less direct and splashes off of the particles more than the laser weapon as impact causes a dissipation of heat away from the impact site more than a laser would, meaning potentially armors resistant to ballistics but weak to lasers might face issues from plasma, unless heat itself would change how the material handles the impact, or the impact handles how the material handles the heat.  Theres also a possibility that the intense speed, and single particle could cause an effect like in the LHC does, where particles impacting creates new particles (like the higs boson) which could wreck havoc which cannot yet be studies well by xcom, be it chemical changes in the target, corrosion, or even reforming the chemical composition of matter in ways which xcom might not entirely grasp yet.

Not sure if anyone cares about this, but it feels better to at least have a head-canon for why some things are better with lasers, others with plasma, and I wonder if maybe this makes sense with lore, or if I completely missed something on this : as far as I can tell this makes sense, though plasma weapons don't have much information on them that I'm aware.

12
The X-Com Files / A look at faction balance.
« on: July 23, 2017, 07:02:52 am »
Ok, so factions currently seem a little lopsided in terms of balance between risks of different levels of forces, and I wanted to talk about this.

For level 1 enemies (lotus disciples, red dawn gangers, dagoon supporters / cultists (I count them as the same) and exalt infiltrators, their potential is very mixed : I'm not against unique enemy types, but I feel the threat level is very different

Hands down lotus grunts are the weakest and most boring, they usually have ABSOLUTELY TINY pistols which cannot pierce kevlar, and will almost never go through combat armor, or have melee weapons / throwing knives, which makes them a non threat at most ranges. this means I can practically ignore them, and its not uncommon to have me kill off all their leaders while ignoring the grunts for the most part and then have them surrender because they are such a very low threat.

Gangers / exalt infiltrators seem mostly fine : variably armed, a threat, but never severe.

Supporters of dagon suffer a bit of what lotus disciples do, but less : usually they have a decent gun, especially later missions, and I never feel I can completely ignore them, even if they are minor threat.

LEVEL 2 enemies

This is exalt grunts, priests, red dawn lads / pioneers, and witches / footmen (not sure what is what level, but this is how I'm organizing it)

Exalt grunts are pretty nasty, usually with guns big enough to make kevlar feel inadequate. Very satisfying to take down. Feels like an actual higher up, and feels like hes significantly more important by how he plays alone.

Lads and pioneers are mixed : sometimes they have great guns, othertime they are useless : lads I almost never have problems with, and I often prioritize a ganger with an AK over a lad with an uzi. Lads never feel like more of an additional threat, and pioneers are very spotty. I think they should have marginally better guns, give lads an mp5 at least. And giving the pioneer VERY minor camo might be a good bet.

priests and chosen :  honestly just feel like slightly amped up disciples of dagon, they have better guns sometimes, but certainly don't feel unique in any way. The chosen in particularly feels like a reskin of the priest, but with different research tree. Hes not noticeably better, or worse at anything, like at least the lad in red dawn is slightly less armored and weaker, but less of a dunce than the gangers.

Black lotus excels with its mid level troop, which makes it fun to fight and unique. Its witches are a bit unpredictable, troubles at close range due to the fireglove, while the footmen are trouble at long range due to snipers : they make their hapless grunts who are barely armed seem horribly under-prepared, which feels silly especially when attacking a hideout and seeing most of them with tiny pistols. Also, black lotus warriors, despite their melee stats, almost never get close enough to threaten. I figure HIGHER TU's and a bit of camo might help.

LEVEL 3 : high tier. Enemies in big bases.

First off, the obvious : the assassin from the black lotus. This guy is absolutely mean, and incredibly dangerous, though once you get incendiary grenades, hes easier to expose and kill. I've lost plenty of people to these guys from knives flying out of nowhere killing folks. Very fitting for a high tier enemy

The avatar from the black lotus is a very scary threat : lasers and flying, which freaks me out early on.  Very much a worthy challenge.

Dagons gilldogs : melee class brings its own weaknesses, but these are extremely nasty and dangerous, I fear them hands down the worst out of any threat dagon has.. which is sad because not much really comes close, Except maybe the deep ones with sonic pistols, but they are very rare.  They tank a lot of damage, and facing more than 1 legitimately scares me.

The dagon ultra priest (I forget his name) is a threat only marginally above others : hes a bit tougher and his staff is a bit dangerous, but I think I've only had 1 troop killed by him in any of my playthroughs. This again, isn't made better considering the rest of the crew is nothing special, besides the dogs. His psi powers would be a little more scary if it was used for something more than flinging acid balls. I suppose I wouldn't care if the priests, chosen, and desciples didn't seem so similar.

Exalt enforcers seem tough, just enough. Their guns and aim make me prioritize them, but they are well balanced, as is the coordinator.

Red ops from red dawn are good and effective : no complaints

===========

With all this said, I have the following recomendations

First, fix the issue with black lotuses wacky balance : ninjas being an immense threat, and followers being a NON threat more of the time. I could argue ninjas could have slightly reduced camo (I can only see them in broad daylight from 2 tiles away) and possibly adjust throwing knives to have longer range slightly, but less damage. And make the followers more of a threat in later missions, later missions they shouldn't still be using clubs and pocket pistols. Give them a crossbow occasionally, an SKS, or even FN minini for one of them in big missions. And possibly give warriors a small amount of camo, so I at least cannot snipe them across the map, with them helpless.

Lads from red dawn usually have little pea shooters which cannot shoot straight : an upgrade to an Mp5, or  some kind of long arm would help, as even if pistols are powerful, the low damage and low range of them makes them very  easy to deal with.

Church of dagoon could use more variety in my opinion : what if the chosen was capable of channeling "the spirit of dagon" giving it increased damage resistance, but making it less graceful than the others? Give it a chainsaw in 1 hand, sawn off in the other and the tenacity of a chupacabra while being slow and lumbering, with zombie like regeneration : This would make it far more diverse, in my opinion, and would make me treat priests and chosen differently..I suppose my only issue here is them being so similar, and not exactly "less effective" but I feel the super natural elements of this could enable more fun ideas than exalt or red dawn.

I also think more should be done to distinguish red damn and exalt : exalt has their psi-clones, red dawn has there body enhancement program : why do these not seem to be prevalent in combat, while dagon and lotus have their quirks?

Anyway, take what you want out of this, I just wanted to point out these issues.

13
Open Feedback / Making openxcom work with onboard graphics
« on: July 19, 2017, 08:02:02 pm »
So apparently openxcom is unable to run on a friend of mines pc, due to it being incompatible with the graphics system involved. He has a very old setup with integrated graphics, and no drivers he can update with : however, he can run halflife2, superhot, ect without problems.

I wonder, could things be tweaked to allow graphics to run on more things, similar to software mode for gzdoom? (runs on pretty much anything) Its not like openxcom is graphic intensive anyways, so I wonder how viable this is... I suspect its because openxcom uses opengl (my friend cannot use gzdoom in opengl mode) and I wonder if its possible to at least have other options.

14
The X-Com Files / Suggestion : Airborn drones
« on: March 19, 2017, 12:33:10 am »
One idea which would be interesting is airborn drones : you know, those cheap flier drones which are remote controlled?

I figure they might be handy in scouting tasks (monster attacks on towns) as well as just in general, as an agile, flying, flexible unit to look around, and possibly even grab light objects out of reach. The flying alone would be useful for scouting, making it immune to all sorts of critters assuming its in the air, allowing it to imperviously peek around and scout where people would be in more danger

Also, maybe as a later game option, a heavier, armored drone, with minebea SMG, or even modified berreta installed?

I know flying armor is a long way out, but getting some kind of airborn capability early on would be very useful, EVEN if the first one is extremely fragile, and without weapons. Plus, if you gave it the ability to hold 3 weight units, it could even be used as a sort of bomber with grenades.

And honestly, such units don't sound too far outside the scope of xcoms funding, tech level, and military regulations to access.

15
The X-Com Files / X-Dogs Equipment.
« on: March 16, 2017, 09:02:36 pm »
Any chance we can give dogs a sort of...suicide vest later on? I know it seems screwy, but it might be helpful, given that dogs attack power is limited and does almost nothing later on. Just something with an armor rigged item that you can prime, and detonates on death (just like holding a grenade on death) so dogs can be disposable kamikaze units...

....Or perhaps a muzzle with a stun rod grafted to the front

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