Messages

1531

The X-Com Files / Re: Ghost missions

« on: August 21, 2021, 08:35:44 pm »

No, the ghost of the tank will still remain behind.

1532

The X-Com Files / Re: Entere the alien embasy

« on: August 21, 2021, 08:34:31 pm »

As I said in my first post on the topic, that would be completely fine if this mechanic was designed as a timer. But it isn't, right now. It's details are largely carried over from vanilla, while all the other aspects of the game are significantly changed. Especially the length of time spent playing, the relatively higher importance of Council funding and massively slower research. You could breeze through OG X-Com in a couple of sittings if you focused on it. People have been playing XCF for RL years.


For reference:

Vanilla infiltration: random 20% chance each month, 2*20% after half a year. One infiltration can take over an entire region (about 8-9 that matter). Council funding is icing on the cake. The game lasts for maybe a year or two. On average, you might lose about two-three regions in the first year, and if you cared about funding, that'd make you start to hurry. But it doesn't. Even Gollop admitted at one point it wasn't really working as intended.

XCF infiltration: ~3-6% per month + another 11%, both after the invasion proper starts. And some one-off invasions for letting the four cults live too long. One infiltration per country (33 total). Council funding is vital to get you off the ground, and a good chunk of your income for quite a while. Manufacturing is no longer profitable and alien loot prices have been nerfed some. I'm not sure how long the game is supposed to last, but I'd guess five years or so at least, unless you bumrush it. That'll lose you maybe six the countries (a fifth) on average, with a large amount of randomness thrown into the mix because of these very low trigger chances and whether the target is a significant donor or not. That's usually negligible except as flavour (of the 'fuck you, player!' variety ), but an unfortunate series of events can cripple someone well into midgame through no fault of their own.

The first, big issue here is the total randomness. Why are only some players hit by the timer, and some harder than others, e.g. the US resigning at the start of the invasion? This subforum has quite a few people posting how they're just hanging on when 1999 hits, and I would completely understand it if one of them got hit by, say, two infiltrations of major donors, went into a downward spiral and lost the game, and then uninstalled XCF in disgust.

The second is that players have no agency when it comes to infiltration, which is generally not a good way to make a game.

The third and shakiest is that the X-Com organisation has no agency, while a number of pedia articles at least suggest they ought to.

Finally, if your main argument in favour of current infiltration is "It sucks, but it doesn't make the game unplayable", then... it's not much of a defence.

XCOM1 designed the whole panic and abduction thing as a central mechanic of the game and tested it thoroughly. I haven't touched XCOM2 and am not planning to.

1533

The X-Com Files / Re: [Lore] Where do Xcom agents get recruited from, exactly?

« on: August 21, 2021, 05:44:16 pm »

The issue is that only the players units are generated with (a range of) randomized stats, while alien stats are fixed.

I don't think it's a problem as such. It's an asymmetric solution to having a progressive variety of units on both sides. Aliens and other enemies have different types/races, X-Com has 'leveling up'.

I would love to see randomzied stats on aliens as well as "randomized" stat caps for soldiers, but as far as I can tell this would be a hell to implement.

Random stat caps for soldiers/agents already exist via scripting. Probably takes a bit to balance it for XCF, but doesn't look that hard.

But I wouldn't really like even remotely the same stat randomisation for enemies. Then visuals would lose a lot of their usefulness and e.g. the line between the different human conspiracies would blur to the point of quite a few of them being practically reskins of each other.

1534

The X-Com Files / Re: Entere the alien embasy

« on: August 21, 2021, 05:35:23 pm »

Some of it is also that the XCF-verse differs quite a bit from both RL and vanilla X-Com, and a lot of the details exist only in Solarius's mind (and maybe posts). I suppose it's a good thing that mapmaking and other new things take precedence, because my SoD is already shot and buried.

[Spoiler]

1535

The X-Com Files / Re: Entere the alien embasy

« on: August 20, 2021, 07:38:11 pm »

Just for the record...

Spoiler ...because I can't leave well enough alone.:

...I have read a variety of Solarius's opinions on the matter, and they are more nuanced than can be seen in this thread. It's just that they have never been succintly elaborated in any one post, or fully on this forum, either. And I do understand where some of his concerns come from. I'm even okay with the removal of embassies as they were. I just don't think his arguments for leaving infiltration as it is are as good as he thinks.

As for his behaviour, if a content creator cannot handle public interaction without getting personal, the better choice is to not say anything at all. Or get a PR guy, or do as Meridian does, say that the decision has been made and you're not interested in more discussion, regardless of its validity or lack thereof, and don't argue any further. Throwing a tantrum will never improve a situation like this. I made my first post ever on the topic, tried to be polite and look at both sides... and got sweared at.

In any case, it is as it is. Solarius is no longer quite the same serene public persona he was five years ago, and we just have to accept it or find other playgrounds. Dioxine is far worse on the PR front, and lots of people can interact with him okay(-ish) and enjoy his creations just fine. I'm not going to try to argue with either of them ever again, it's like wrestling in a mud pit.

1536

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 1.9: Free Falling

« on: August 20, 2021, 07:17:44 pm »

Sorry, EXALT who???

Enforcers. Whose only big advantage is that they're snipers, but we already had that discussion.

...this is the level where you get normal grenades and industrial explosives... The RPG is a purely military weapon, therefore belonging strictly in the Promo 3 category.

IRL, RPG-7 is about as available as hand grenades and AKs, though. There are pirate fishermen touting RPGs, and the Taliban are now using them in their 'police' patrols of Kabul... Javelin, Spike, CG, etc... These aren't handed out like candy.

OTOH, this is our real world, and the one in XCF is somewhat different, and the red tape even more so.

I changed the standard extinguisher a couple days ago to work the same way.
But it's instant. Also, you can deploy multiple per turn. In short, as designed.

Ah, okay. I wrote this before I read that discussion.

It's so much better though!
(And later on, you'll be able to buy monster-related items for cash.)

No problems with getting to buy it later on. It's just that there's this huge gap between "rare as hen's teeth" and then you suddenly get an unlimited supply. Would be more interesting if we got multiple per Muckstar corpse. Even 3-5 would be relatively workable.

Basically, you're really not guaranteed any Muckstars, and the ones you do get leave you with a very small stockpile. The +25% damage isn't really so much better that you'd want to use your extremely tiny amount of clips, outside of very rare circumstances. You'll have to switch to that ammo mid-battle, or have a very specific mission in mind, otherwise even reloading the more powerful ammo is worse than just shooting an extra time with regular batteries.

Not that I'm really using Tasers much after dartguns become available. The only reason to do so is to be able to just buy more clips instead of shuffling engineers around. But Muckstar ammo doesn't help with that.

Maybe it's just me.

Perhaps the bonuses you get from commendations are too good, but I don't want to remove them.

Yeah, I see your problem. If it was me, I'd just remove all commendation bonuses except bravery and go back to high-casualty warfare, but I understand that XCF is trying to be a more personal experience. I think these two contradictory goals will never be fully compatible, but all the small changes you mentioned ought to help.

1537

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

« on: August 20, 2021, 06:47:49 pm »

Yeah, it's to promote the usage of auto, and therefore hamper reacting.

Hmm, maybe boost the values a little, then, so the advantages are a bit more clear. And possibly make the values a tiny little bit different, so it's absolutely clear this is not a copy-paste typo. Maybe something like auto TU 42% -> 40%, accuracy 40 -> 44, and snap TU 42% -> 39%, accuracy 40 -> 45? This is roughly in-between Assault LMG snap and auto shots.

And/or add something to the pedia description. Like "This light machine gun is equipped with advanced stabilizers and an integral bipod [What's a bipod system, anyway? Marketing speak?], giving it better accuracy with auto-shots. The added weight makes it harder to maneuver quickly. It uses conventional LMG ammunition.[It doesn't, it uses the same BO rounds as the other two BO machine guns. Well, okay, it's conventional all right, but I think the idea was that it uses the same ammo as its predecessor?]"

1538

The X-Com Files / Re: Clarification questions

« on: August 19, 2021, 10:15:42 pm »

In general, the reference doc is your friend. The in-game information screen also has a 'default values' button, but sometimes the names of variables differ from those in the ruleset. For human readability, I guess.

Both of these values are 0 by default, and somewhere around 10 bulletspeed and 2-3 explosion speed is starting to edge into 'blink and you miss it' territory.

1539

The X-Com Files / Re: Clarification questions

« on: August 19, 2021, 10:51:58 am »

There is also explosion speed, but it is only on Miniguns, and I have no idea what it does.
I want it to be faster, but not instant

That speeds up the 'hit explosion', which is analogous to bulletspeed for projectiles. Setting that to even 2 or 3 is, again, a more immersive solution than deleting the hit animation altogether.

So I just need to identify all the SMG in the game

Solarius has helpfully already done that. Use his item filter strings to search for specific item classes.

1540

The X-Com Files / Re: Clarification questions

« on: August 19, 2021, 02:47:43 am »

AFAIK, yes. I think Solarius rewrote them at one point? Might have been back in the days before 0.4, even.

1541

The X-Com Files / Re: Clarification questions

« on: August 19, 2021, 01:42:47 am »

I guess the correct term is personal lighting. I mean, your soldiers are always automatically lit when combat starts, so... auto-lights.

1542

The X-Com Files / Re: Clarification questions

« on: August 18, 2021, 08:35:00 pm »

And it also implies that they should't be able to die from overstun either

Yeah, looks like it.

Now if only there was an indicator for "is Illumiated" because I am not entirely sure about how far from flares I need to stand.

I think the auto-lights are about at the threshold. Toggle the lights a few (hundred) times, and then gauge battlescape lighting according to that.

...probably still not able to burn down sections of forest in a reasonable time period to clear LOS.

Explosives. Lots of explosives has always been the X-Com answer to everything.

Mainly it is the part where for rapidfire guns like the Minigun and machine gun have you follow EVERY SINGLE BULLET, which is okay for some weapons.

Miniguns are already very fast, aren't they? Machine guns, rifles and SMG's, there I agree. I added bulletspeed 8-12 to those myself, and it's more or less okay.

Red flash on damage helps a lot, but sometimes it hits with no flash, and causes bleeding.

Maybe the red flashing script doesn't account for miniscule damage? Because only damage is supposed to cause wounds in core code. IDK, I haven't really paid attention.

But I also sometimes have a melee guy next to an enemy ranged attacker, and want to know how badly that effects them, and what the effective dodge/clash chances are.

Enable debug mode, m-click, press F1.

I should probably enter the discord. That sounds fun.

Well, it's where the XCF development and discussion is these days. Myself, I dislike Discord for anything complex, since it's hard to make a good long argument in that format, any filtering between your brain and your fingers is more or less gone, and browsing for information is non-existent. Vast numbers of people disagree with me.

1543

The X-Com Files / Re: Help with the game's features

« on: August 18, 2021, 03:57:59 pm »

Isn't it easier to just rebind the key combination, if you're already using a program for that? (Or get a programmable keyboard... ) (Regularly) recompiling OXCE just for one function looks like massive overkill.

1544

The X-Com Files / Re: Clarification questions

« on: August 18, 2021, 02:26:23 pm »

It all depends on the target.

Of course. Your method is very nice if you don't care about shooting aliens in the face with LAZORS and PLASMA BULLETS! Some others might care about that, though.

1545

The X-Com Files / Re: Clarification questions

« on: August 18, 2021, 01:46:04 pm »

battleFireSpeed: 1000
As a result, all shots are instantaneous and there is no delay between hits.

There will also be no firing animation to speak of. Bulletspeed is technically the better solution, or even something like the Hyper&Trajectory mod. But it requires a lot of boring manual work, because there are so effin many weapons.