Messages

16

The X-Com Files / Re: Vampire Knights

« on: November 08, 2020, 05:56:36 am »

Setting them on fire is reliable but takes ages to kill them. Their healthpool is really big. So besides getting through their thick armour/resistances, you also have to deal a good amount of damage.
Dynamite is too weak. High Explosives are reliable but it still takes several.
No matter the damage type, if the weapon doesn't do tons of damage, don't even bother, unless your agents are able to keep a safe distance at all times.
I don't want to spoil anything by telling you what damage types are best. If you want to know that, you can check the wiki.

So if fire is all you have right now, keep using that while running away and hope, that the vampire knight drops before your sanity does.

17

The X-Com Files / Re: Too much research...

« on: November 03, 2020, 08:45:45 pm »

Ha... I would if I needed the money. I have like £25m with nothing to spend it on. I prefer having weapons of mass destruction in my cupboard to hordes of cash.... Just seems cooler somehow.

If you are so rich, why don't you just spend the money on more labs and scientists? Seems like a no-brainer in your situation. What else were you saving the cash for?

18

The X-Com Files / Re: Too much research...

« on: November 03, 2020, 04:15:21 am »

Don't keep all your plasma weapons. Sell all or most of them. You will get plenty more before you will be able to use them.

19

The X-Com Files / Re: Too much research...

« on: November 03, 2020, 12:50:35 am »

I have 80 scientists in december of '99. 40 in main base, 10 in every other base. I'm going to stock up on more scientists for the invasion, but for now progress was fast enough for my taste. I don't have enough money to build all the stuff I research, anyway. I don't have lasers yet but Skymarshal, HWPs, Personal and Aqua Plastic Armour so I don't feel underpowered in the field. I do research the 'unnecessary' topics, as long as they are quick to do (Upper left shows you the expected duration, but in weird symbols and not in numbers - look here: https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php/topic,8663.0.html).

However, do i need to research a 'wrench' or other such base items (pitchforks, crowbar etc) to unlock stuff? Or is it just flavour and making them a purchasable item in the lists?

Middle mouse click on research topics and you can see, if they lead to further research.

20

The X-Com Files / Re: Technomad map problem

« on: October 28, 2020, 12:55:43 am »

Maps are sometimes randomly generated in a way, where areas are inaccessible by normal means. But enemies can still spawn there. Usually this is unintentional and considered a bug but in this type of map it IS intentional and the briefing tells you this.

Without looking at your save, there's probably a room or several rooms without a door. You have to make your own openings. Dynamite isn't strong enough, use High Explosive.
With the most recent update, melee weapons have also become capable of destroying terrain, so you could try that, too. I haven't played in a while, though, so I don't know which ones would be best for the job.

21

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 1.6: Life Will Never Be The Same

« on: October 22, 2020, 05:59:41 am »

Besides having different amounts of charges, medical items also heal different amounts of HP/stamina/morale per use. Also, costs of using them are different and some can be used on self, while others can't.

22

The X-Com Files / Re: Red Dawn HQ vents warfare

« on: October 19, 2020, 04:04:55 pm »

Could the explosives have been thrown from one of the entries or through one of the big holes in the ground?
This has never happened to me before, but I am always quick in securing the surface, so no enemy can spot my squad for his compatriots in the vents, anyway.

23

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 1.5.1: Around The World

« on: October 15, 2020, 08:51:16 pm »

enemy units will now react to melee attacks

Oh no!

targeting terrain with melee weapons is now possible!

OH YES!

24

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 1.5.1: Around The World

« on: October 15, 2020, 05:01:06 am »

After some transformations, like pilot training or martial arts training, your agents are indeed transferred. Apparently the training happens off-site and takes quite a while.
Other transformations, like bio-enhancement and the tactical implant (i presume, haven't actually gotten that far yet), require surgery, so the "wounded" status is appropriate.

I agree, it would be nice to be notified, whenever an agent recovers from their wounds, and not only after a transformation.

25

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 1.5.1: Around The World

« on: September 28, 2020, 04:20:49 pm »

I gotta say though, the ski resort mission has become significantly easier, ever since the map has been replaced. Now it's not a resort town anymore but just a a single house (where you spawn) in the middle of a snowy desert. As long as the house spawns at the edge of the map (every single time for me so far) your agents can just take cover behind the house and snipe away at the enemies with sports rifles. All the enemies have zero cover.


Another subject:
Is anyone else having trouble finding Zombie Infectors? If I'm not mistaken, those are the gateway to receiving MAGMA lab missions, which I am very antsy to get into. I want those zombie trooper implants!
In the first campaign, that I started quite a while ago, I encountered many infectors in a variety of missions and I was fighting zombie troopers already in mid '98. But in my second campaign and now in my third I'm having no luck. Now in December '98 I haven't found a single one, yet. I haven't skipped any zombie missions, but all I encounter are normal zombies, fat zombies and boomers and a Vampire Knight once. I'm not receiving any catacomb missions either, which always used to contain a couple of infectors.
Did something change or am I just unlucky?

26

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 1.5.1: Around The World

« on: September 28, 2020, 05:00:50 am »

Beach missions are worth the danger, most of the time.
They are the earliest opportunity to capture a member of the Osiron faction and unlock further missions against them.
Enemies have some nice weapons for the early game.
And most importantly the 3 crates you find in every mission usually contain some alien tech. Most of the stuff in there is either useful or valuable.

Industrial and ski resort missions on the other hand indeed give you nothing of great value.

But there are also other, more rare, undercover missions, which you don't unlock through research topics. There's a 'concerned citizens' mission for example, that will give you quite a bit more negative points, if ignored, but is also significantly easier.

27

The X-Com Files / Re: Sniper Chickens?!

« on: September 26, 2020, 03:54:50 pm »

It could be like the secret cow level in Diablo 2, requiring the player to complete some obscure task for it to spawn. Like finding some loot, that is only dropped by a certain civilian in a certain mission in a mapblock, that is inaccessible to enemies. Researching said loot gives the player a manufacturing project requiring all kinds of weird ingredients.
The resulting item, once researched, finally spawns the secret sniper chicken mission, where you have to save some Ayyys, who are stranded in the dreamscape and set upon by avian assassins.

Or something like that

28

The X-Com Files / Re: Questions on Promo 3 and relative progress...

« on: September 24, 2020, 07:06:46 pm »

1 - Yes, you need only one of them for Promotion III.

2 - Cave missions can contain a variety of loot (some of which leads to 'Into the Dark') and a large variety of creatures. Silacoids aren't even the most dangerous ones. The best general loadout for this mission type is shotguns, some flamers, knives or similar and explosives. Bio-Exo suits are an absolute necessity.

3 - BlackOps rifles and pistols are great general purpose weapons at this point. If you need more damage against unarmoured foes, the BlackOps SMG or any shotgun will work well. Against armour, use weapons with damage scaling, usually sniper rifles and melee weapons. Or just boom-boom. Personally, my teams become rather sniper-heavy, once pilot-training with its substantial acc-boost becomes available.
Most alien weapons are still far-off. Selling all but one of each alien laser or plasma weapon is a good idea. Chemguns can be adapted pretty early on, though. Tritanium ammo requires not just tritanium itself, but it also requires you to find the relevant ammo for each weapon. In the case of BlackOps weapons, you have to jump through yet another hoop and steal the tech from the Syndicate.

4 - 50 scientists is more than enough at this point. Possibly even too much. You said yourself, that you are having trouble with money. But it's ok, if you still have plenty of useful stuff to research.
20 engineers might very well suffice at this point, but you will feel the need for many more very soon. I like to keep as few of them on staff for as long as possible, until I actually have a lot of stuff to build and the money to do it.

29

The X-Com Files / Re: Sniper Chickens?!

« on: September 22, 2020, 07:22:53 am »

This is priceless...
Part of me hopes this will never get fixed.

30

The X-Com Files / Re: X-Com Files Copyrighted music

« on: September 12, 2020, 04:28:56 am »

I suppose, you weren't given any details? Like whose intellectual property you violated, the property itself or any timestamp?
Where did you stream? Twitch, I guess?

There aren't any replacement files for this specific mod, but the sound files are easily replaced by hand.
All music files are stored in
user>mods>XComFiles>SOUND

The files are taken from a variety of sources: Vanilla X-Com itself,  tracks made by modders for modders, movies, etc. but most of all: other video games.
It is impossible for me to know, which tracks you got in trouble for.

IMO, the most likely culprits are:
THING.ogg from the movie 'The Thing' by John Carpenter (occurs frequently in Zombie missions)
FRO_PSY.ogg, 'Frontier Psychiatrist' by The Avalanches (occurs only once in the Asylum mission) (watch the music video, you won't regret it)

You can take any other OGG file, rename it, and replace any suspect music file with it. MP3 files can easily be converted to OGG by many different programs or online services.
The mod portal (and by extension, this forum) contains several music collections, which were made for X-Com-related projects or for use with Open X-Com itself. These shouldn't give you any copyright strikes.