Messages

811

OXCE Wishlists / Re: [Suggestion][Rulesets] Issues that stopped me from adding features to SALT.

« on: July 20, 2022, 12:04:50 pm »

This will likely lead to problems if your commander gets wounded and you want or must do missions in the meanwhile. In most cases I suppose it could be argued that highest ranking officer on duty should go on the most important missions. There are however many scenarios where you won't want even that (for example, if your higher ranked soldiers have poor PSI strength so you want to leave them out). But I suppose this is an issue a mod author needs to consider; personally I rather see this making the gaming experience worse than better.

812

OXCE Suggestions Archive / Re: [Suggestion] Counter civilian stunning exploit

« on: July 15, 2022, 08:20:59 am »

Well yeah, the whole purpose of civilians is that they're supposed to be a liability. You're supposed to be aggressive and take risks to save them as fast as possible. Stunning isn't a "strategic option", it's an exploit and you know it. If anything, stunning civilians removes strategy from the game. Instead of having to carefully advance and position your units, and cover civilians, you simply stun them, no risk at all. Well, even if this suggestion was implemented, you'd still be able to stun civilians and drag them to a safe spot, so it wouldn't be pointless.

Anyway, it would be useful to get the opinion of the mod makers on this matter.

Another way to address this issue could be to give negative points for stunned civilians (possibly less negative than killed one). I don't know if you can do that already, but I suspect that should be possible. That should give the modders a chance to defeat the strategy. Or alternatively, make civilians susceptible to high stun, so that they could die as a result of being stunned.

813

Open Feedback / Re: Game Over

« on: June 27, 2022, 06:41:02 pm »

I'm playing a game of vanilla TFTD, and for some reason the game just ends at the monthly report for September 2040.  Is there a time limit I don't know about? 
The odd thing is I'm doing very well, never lost a funding country, destroyed the two alien artifact sites that appeared, never lost a tactical or terror mission, etc.  I have Mag Ion armor, Psi disruptors and was researching the first new sub based on alien tech but at the monthly review it just says I failed to stop the alien invasion and it's game over.  There are two alien bases that I left as the supply ships that land at them give me a steady supply of zrbite/aqua plastics, if I destroy those before the end of the month will the game continue?  Or can anyone tell me why it's just suddenly game over?

Very likely you have had two bad months (too big a negative score, the threshold depends on difficulty) back-to-back? Destroying a base will certainly make the score go positive, but you can accomplish this otherwise as well.

814

Released Mods / Re: [TFTD] [Expansion] TWoTS+ Release (v.2.51)

« on: June 27, 2022, 06:38:07 pm »

QoL = quality of life, making the game smoother to play

I think almost always you can just update the mod and continue a game started with a previous version. I think you should be comfortable with starting now.

P.S. I'm interested in hearing how you plan to deal with randomly appearing hunter-killers. After they start approaching, do you plan to always accompany your transports with multiple defenders (see the earlier posts, I just save/reloaded in these cases but I wonder what will be your ironman strategy)?

815

Released Mods / Re: X-Chronicles Release, v.0.99.6

« on: June 27, 2022, 03:05:35 pm »

Just noticed something strange. If Irungu Tikolo launches a grenade at a Footman, the game freezes just before the impact of the missile (and you can't do anything). If you shoot the footman twice using rifles, he dies all right. Previously in the mission I already killed a footman with a grenade launcher. I wonder if Nord/OXCE dev has ideas what's going on? I'm using the OXCE snap 2022-06-16. I still have debug enabled in options.cfg if it matters.

There are some warnings in the logs about some things to fix in the mod, but I don't suppose they are relevant.

[27-06-2022_14-52-46]   [INFO]   Creating transparency LUTs for PAL_BATTLESCAPE...
[27-06-2022_14-52-46]   [INFO]   After load.
[27-06-2022_14-52-46]   [INFO]   Supressed Error for 'STR_MALE_VIP': This unit has a corresponding item to recover, but still isn't recoverable. Reason: (the unit is marked with 'capturable: false'). Consider marking the unit with 'liveAlien: ""'.
[27-06-2022_14-52-46]   [INFO]   Supressed Error for 'STR_PHOENIX': This unit has a corresponding item to recover, but still isn't recoverable. Reason: (the first 'corpseBattle' item of the unit's armor is marked with 'recover: false'). Consider marking the unit with 'liveAlien: ""'.
[27-06-2022_14-52-46]   [INFO]   Loading ended.
[27-06-2022_14-52-46]   [INFO]   Data loaded successfully.
[27-06-2022_14-52-46]   [INFO]   Loading language...
[27-06-2022_14-52-46]   [INFO]   Language loaded successfully.
[27-06-2022_14-52-46]   [INFO]   OpenXcom started successfully!
[27-06-2022_14-52-46]   [INFO]   Using software scaling routine. For best results, try an OpenGL filter.
[27-06-2022_14-52-53]   [WARN]   Image Resources/TerrainPack/Geoscape/TEXTURE15.png (from lodepng) has incorrect transparent color index 255 (instead of 0).
[27-06-2022_14-52-53]   [WARN]   Image Resources/TerrainPack/Geoscape/TEXTURE36.png (from lodepng) has incorrect transparent color index 255 (instead of 0).
[27-06-2022_14-52-53]   [WARN]   Image Resources/TerrainPack/Geoscape/TEXTURE57.png (from lodepng) has incorrect transparent color index 255 (instead of 0).
[27-06-2022_14-52-53]   [INFO]   MCD BOAT_FURN object 0 has 0 armor
[27-06-2022_14-52-53]   [INFO]   MCD BOAT_FURN object 17 has 0 armor
 

816

Released Mods / Re: X-Chronicles Release, v.0.99.6

« on: June 27, 2022, 10:45:08 am »

What would more money achieve? Let the player hire more scientists?

Yes. That would accelerate getting into mid- and end-game. I have already played over two years game time, and am still in early game phase (though I suppose I could have entered mid-game already if I had rushed it). *) It could have gone a bit faster with more research and (to lesser degree) more efficient tech to capture essential and tougher live invaders. But it is of course up to the author how long a campaign he wants to create. In contrast, I loved the pacing of TWoTS, but this mod is obviously intended to run much longer.

*) Other alternatives to accelerate the game could be making the traditional weapons, X-rifles etc. more efficient - to make the missions faster as most enemies would be knocked out with 1-2 hits - and/or reducing the amount of rather useless encounters (animal terror missions, rifts, etc.) that after a couple of instances do not really progress the plot.

This feels like a mistake lol

I reported similar with TWoTS (by the same author). It was intentional that even tanks can be taken out of action temporarily by certain weapons. Of course, the message is confusing - but it is probably engine limitation and cannot be changed. I suppose it's the same here.

817

Released Mods / Re: X-Chronicles Release, v.0.99.6

« on: June 25, 2022, 11:28:40 pm »

Do you suggest to increase funding? Or maybe increase prices of invader stuff?

I'd suggest increasing sell prices of invader stuff, at least. Also, I'd suggest making various special events (beast terror missions, graveyards, rifts, etc.) yield something you can sell for some money (currently the corpses aren't worth much at all), for example shai-huluds could be disassembled to produce expensive teeth or something. At the moment, these missions are money-wise worthless, yet take some time to complete (especially if you have village mazes, tough enemies, etc.; FWIW I also got glass spider once in antarctic and the mission was unsolvable: one of them was camouflaging on an inaccessible ice island, and I had to use debug mode to get rid of it)

I'm currently in January 2022 and total council funding is at 19M (I have the whole globe covered with 6 bases). There's still 3-4M surplus every month (with about 150 scientists). Yet I'm still only 19 % through the research tree. To make the game progression faster and reduce the grinding elements somewhat, I suppose you could also increase the council funding and how fast it grows. There could also be some items engineers could manufacture and you could sell, to make use of engineers and earn money, but I understand completely if you want to avoid that kind of economy (I have felt it's rather stupid myself).

They are meant to be used not by normal humans, but by psions.

Hmm? I wonder if these are phased properly. You are able to get X-contract likely much earlier than getting psions. It seems you get on the path leading to psionic powers through researching fire mage, rune mage, etc. I have postponed researching them to delay legionaires and more difficult enemies appearing.

But for what it's worth, X sniper rifles are at least very usable with humans. Others I haven't used that much (though rifle could be useful with spare clips).

BTW, I think the first alien base (hive) appeared in October 2021 or so. I don't think there's much chance of dealing with it yet, so I have had to leave it be and grow. Also, there have been some other enemies that seem to be non-defeatible for now (for example the UFOs with stalkers and the other beasts, the other ice thingies behind ice rift).

818

Released Mods / Re: X-Chronicles Release, v.0.99.6

« on: June 24, 2022, 02:26:14 pm »

I resumed my earlier play. No legionaires anymore (yet). Some small ships are reasonably difficult, when they include a fire and/or rune mage (alienRaces.rul:STR_FEUDALS suggests about 1/10 odds for small UFO being full of mages and wizards, in most cases these are straightforward). You need reasonable RNG and/or save scumming to avoid heavy casualties. Also, just a moment ago (October 2021), a large ship landed on a terror mission. First look outside shows a rune mage and a baron facing the osprey entrance. If I understand correctly, these have started spawning after you get the !X-contract! (why this spelling, by the way?) ie. STR_INTERNATIONALIZATION. At least with that spawn location the mission appears to be impossible, so I might need to skip that (or save scum it)

I kind of agree with xcommie that there are quite a few of "boring" events, which are usually relatively easy but might take some time (graveyards, rifts, other animal encounters, a mad psion). I suppose it could be argued that it's good to have some kind of missions. But these won't really give you much money or points, so I suppose the main point is getting training for the soldiers. I guess there are less than five a month, so not a huge problem.

It is also interesting how the economy of XCHR differs from the main games. At least until now you are almost completely dependent on council funding, you don't get much from missions - except when you can sell ships' rune glyphs. This means that the game needs to run for multiple years (waiting for more money from the council to be able to expand). Likewise, at least so far manufacturing has been useless; there is not much to produce with your engineers, so to date I have only kept 1 engineer. I suppose this results in a "grindier" game based more on waiting for the time to pass by.

819

OpenXcom Extended (OXCE) / Re: OXCE (OpenXcom Extended) main thread

« on: June 15, 2022, 10:19:49 pm »

Well I tried 7.5.9 from https://lxnt.wtf/oxem/#/Extended, still crashing

You need at least 7.5.14 to get the fixes that went in in Apr 24.

820

OpenXcom Extended (OXCE) / Re: OXCE (OpenXcom Extended) main thread

« on: June 14, 2022, 10:39:48 pm »

OXCE crashes when I pressing "preview" button on Moray interceptor. I think it happened because this ship used for interception purposes but not for delivery aquanauts.

Code: [Select]

[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] A fatal error has occurred: Segmentation fault.
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x5cbe20 OpenXcom::CrossPlatform::stackTrace(void*)
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x5ccca0 OpenXcom::CrossPlatform::crashDump(void*, std::__cxx11::basic_string<char, std::char_traits<char>, std::allocator<char> > const&)
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x41c7f0 signalLogger(int)
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x9f4930 OpenXcom::UfopaediaStartState::think()
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x7fff6e19c6d0 _C_specific_handler
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x7fff6e1b1fb0 _chkstk
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x7fff6e161020 RtlRaiseException
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x7fff6e1b0bd0 KiUserExceptionDispatcher
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x522710 OpenXcom::BattlescapeGenerator::run()
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x447960 OpenXcom::CraftSoldiersState::btnPreviewClick(OpenXcom::Action*)
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x5e8860 OpenXcom::InteractiveSurface::handle(OpenXcom::Action*, OpenXcom::State*)
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x6a4380 OpenXcom::State::handle(OpenXcom::Action*)
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x5e3f50 OpenXcom::Game::run()
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x41c950 SDL_main
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x9f6460 console_main
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x9f6580 WinMain
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] ??
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] ??
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x7fff6c757020 BaseThreadInitThunk
[14-06-2022_21-00-54] [FATAL] 0x7fff6e162630 RtlUserThreadStart
[14-06-2022_21-01-02] [FATAL] OpenXcom has crashed: Segmentation fault.I'm adding save file too.
Question about OXCE special strings - any STR in ruleset what could be used to prevent crash and remove preview button there when player selecting non-transport ship?

I reported this in May 3 with 2021-04-04 version IIRC (in TWoTS thread). It was supposed to be fixed in the next release. There seem to have been relevant changes in github on Apr 24. I wonder you tested the latest version or the problem still persists?

821

Released Mods / Re: [TFTD] [Expansion] TWoTS+ Release (v.2.51)

« on: June 05, 2022, 09:22:57 am »

If you put a 2x2 HWP on Poseidon, it's deployed "crossways" so it can't get out until you move quite a few aquanauts. If you put two 2x2 HWP's, both are stuck and you have to move out almost all aquanauts so that you are able to first move one HWP inside the craft out of the way of the doors. In this example I also had a 1x1 HWP. Would it be somehow possible to change the floor plan of Poseidon so that 2x2 HWP would be deployed in the front of a door so that it could  be moved out first (similar as with Triton)?

822

Released Mods / Re: [TFTD] [Expansion] TWoTS+ Release (v.2.51)

« on: June 04, 2022, 03:39:31 pm »

Ok, thanks, I had missed this.

I also noticed Jellymen using a weapon (tangler?) to remove TUs and do stun. The weird thing was that squid light drone was knocked unconscious. I have never before seen a drone/HWP being stunned. Is this intentional for this weapon or is a squid drone special, having been created using a bio-drone corpse?

823

OpenXcom Extended (OXCE) / Re: OXCE (OpenXcom Extended) main thread

« on: June 03, 2022, 11:14:37 pm »

Is the drone a HWP-like unit?
If yes, it doesn't really "exist" on geoscape like soldiers... and nothing can be saved on it.

It's a 1x1 unit. So maybe yes. In some respects, it's different from traditional 2x2 HWPs. But I suppose the result is the same.

The differences are for example that some but not all 1x1 drones can examine and pick up items or bodies. So that feature is distinct from the size.

I wonder why a 2x2 HWP can't identify a body (whether it's alive or not, for example) while 1x1 can. I wonder if this has something to do with the precise location of 2x2 being undefined or something else.

824

OpenXcom Extended (OXCE) / Re: OXCE (OpenXcom Extended) main thread

« on: June 03, 2022, 07:19:47 pm »

I noticed with TWoTS that the equipment given to the drones is not saved across missions, like with aquanauts, so when you always want to give them the same equipment, you need to do it every time. I suppose this could be an OXCE issue, rather than the mod? Shouldn't the equipment be treated the same way irrespective of whether you are equipping a soldier or an equipment-carrying drone?

825

Hardmode Expansion / Re: [EXPANSION]Hardmode Expansion -- General Feedback Thread

« on: June 03, 2022, 06:42:13 pm »

I've skimmed over the explosive weapons, I've never bothered to research HC/AC explosive ammo and I've done well enough to get to Lasers/Personal armour without researching elerium yet. Considering how long it takes to research even the most basic of things I've found I hyper prioritise things I find critically important rather than minor things that may not be as important.
Stronger explosives are nice, but lasers will handle most enemies and I can equip them to anyone. Once I get to full Lasers and Power Suits I tend to go back and pick up the minor things I've missed.

Also I've never really found a home for the AC/HC in my armoury. Most of my early soldiers run with Rifles with Shotguns in their backpack, and then some combination of Grenade Launchers, Rocket Launchers and Snipers.
(...)

Similar take in my two campaigns. By the time mutons start appearing regularly, you have been able to rush the lasers if you concentrate on building the research infrastructure quickly. (I usually farm the supply cruisers for a while and do the first base in Feb/Mar, depending on money and other factors). Against mutons in close combat, laser shotgun is great and over longer distances multiple sniper rifles do the trick. I also never used AC/HC, they seemed too heavy and too inaccurate in the beginning to be useful. In the beginning I usually used 3-5 grenade launchers (almost overpowered against beginning foes?), 3-5 sniper rifles w/ alloy ammo and some shotgunners. Biggest difficulty prior to lasers and alien grenades were certain terror units which required quite a few even heavier explosives (especially if you have a cyberdisc, and silacoid to lesser degree, terror mission while still working with grenadiers and alloy ammo).