Messages

256

Playthroughs / Re: X-Com Files Mod The Hardest by Fomka (Superman, Ironman, Handicaps)

« on: June 08, 2022, 06:19:06 pm »

Turn 10
Let's hide and wait for the boar to bleed out! 2 HITs is a serious injury, it'll be quick.

Turn 30

I am sorry, but I am unsubscribing from this playthrough. This tactics is unacceptable. And if you are playing with handicaps, this waiting should be number one in the forbidden list.

257

The X-Com Files / Re: Night missions lighting problems

« on: June 03, 2022, 06:05:34 pm »

You can turn it off with "L" just in case.

This "L" shortcut proved to be very useful. When personal lighting is off it is very easy do detect if agent is standing in complete darkness or not.
The question about agent's visibility in near darkness level still is open though.

258

Playthroughs / Re: X-Com Files Mod The Hardest by Fomka (Superman, Ironman, Handicaps)

« on: June 02, 2022, 06:12:08 pm »

"all the globe is covered with Hyper-wave decoders at 8 bases, 10 Thunderstorms are nullifying all medium-sized UFOs, 160 agents clad in Assault suits and Cyber Armor can travel in 7 Skymarshalls and the first Firestorm has been constructed, the pinnacle of technology that would have been soon be obsolete through efforts of 100 scientists and 200 engineers".

Yeah, this is when you declare yourself a winner and get slightly annoyed that game does not recognize that...

I forgot to ask, do you think that machine guns and explosives are overpowered and that is why you will not buy them? I heard earlier, that every problem in XCOM can be solved with sufficient amount of explosives, but I personally don't understand how. If you use C4 like a normal grenade often, then your agents will blow up also often, I think. Especially if you prime them in advance.

259

The X-Com Files / Re: Is "farming" cults worth doing?

« on: June 01, 2022, 06:27:07 pm »

Have anyone tried to farm Cult Mansions? Unlike all other cult stuff (including HQs), mansions do not disappear when you evacuate. So in theory it is possible to assault a mansion, kill almost all cultists, optionally grab some valuable stuff, evacuate, and assault again after refueling! Lot of XP if you are lucky. Never tried this, so not 100% sure it is possible.

260

Playthroughs / Re: X-Com Files Mod, Superman, Ironman-ish

« on: May 30, 2022, 07:05:53 pm »

Another question about this wonderful playthrough:
Are you using Advanced Movements? Can't find that info in your posts. Do you even know about Advanced Movements? I have discovered about that recently and was shocked (again). As far as I know this mod is balanced around using Advanced Movements, so this is not cheating.
In any case, can you please add this info on your first post? I think it is important.

261

Playthroughs / Re: X-Com Files Mod The Hardest by Fomka (Superman, Ironman, Handicaps)

« on: May 30, 2022, 06:27:52 pm »

Can you, please, tell us about your experience with this mod?
And what about Dagonization?
Nullifying bonuses from being injured by hand looks nightmarish.
Good luck.

262

The X-Com Files / Re: Night missions lighting problems

« on: May 29, 2022, 10:57:37 am »

Engine determine this and if engine will not expose this to mods then mod can't do any thing to solve it,

Oh, fantastic! Not only lighting level is obscured from player, but also from program! A was not wrong when I said, that game does everything to hide the truth.

Lighting from all sources in a tile sums up and if it is above a certain threshold you are seen as if it is day.

I really hope this is not how it works. Words "sums up" suggests that 1 soldier in darkness is fine, but 4 soldiers standing together combine their "personal lighting" and become visible. No, my experience shows this is not happening.

It is an issue for the OXCE forum. There are other mods that use Night Combat like XCF, I think Piratez for example.

Considering that that these mods exists for many years, and this issue with lighting is still present, I don't think something will changed in the future. But really strange that this discussion hasn't occurred earlier (I checked forum).

For problem at hand, script can detect this, and make unit lot darken when invisible, and more bright when visible.
Or we can see a different color arrow when pressing Alt. Lighter or darker soldiers is prone to errors.

Both solutions are bad. Player need to know about tile lighting before moving an agent in.

In any case, thanks for replys.

263

The X-Com Files / Re: Night missions lighting problems

« on: May 28, 2022, 11:29:35 pm »

This is directly related to XCF, because it is XCF which made lighting important. Base game clearly preferred cosmetic over functionality. So, may be there is another mod that helps with lighting? Something like night vision toggle by space or scroll lock.

264

The X-Com Files / Night missions lighting problems

« on: May 28, 2022, 11:39:38 am »

After a lot of research about unit visibility during night missions I found several important info:

• During night missions units have reduced visibility.
• When a unit is lit by a light source it is visible like during a day.
• There is no such thing as "brightly lit" or "slightly lit". Either a unit is visible like at night or like at day.
• In a base game aliens (player's only opponent) at night see as good as at day, so it was irrelevant for a player to hide his units in darkness.
• In this mode, however, putting your agents in dark areas is a matter of life and death.
• Game does pretty much everything to prevent player to know with certainty if a specific tile is considered to be lit or not.
• According to this article https://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php/Night_Missions there is a "cosmetic" lighting. That is it looks like a light, but it is not.

The big question is: is there a way to know with certainty if a specific tile is lit or not?
More specific question is about Dragonfly craft. It has light sources that produce very strange asymmetric shadow with some parts being slightly lighter then others. Agents stationed beneath the Dragonfly often are targeted by enemies even from afar with no obvious spotters near by. I know, enemy soldiers are capable to shoot at places where they saw player's agents even few turns earlier, so maybe this is not due to agents are actually standing at light, but who knows?

265

Playthroughs / Re: X-Com Files Mod, Superman, Ironman-ish

« on: May 25, 2022, 06:36:06 pm »

So you bought a piu-piu-helicopter? I find it useless. It can only fight cultist mansion vehicles (and even not all of them). But is it really worth to fight them at all? Cultist vehicles activate only when you are close to a mansion and after that fall into sleep for a while. So you don't even have to "clear your way" for ground troops. I am not sure even about do pilots even gain experience from air battles...

Do you also find it frustrating, that on special mission screen there is info about allowed armor, but no info about what craft can be used? Before every such mission I have to "test" it using OSPREY to see allowed crafts. Text about allowed equipment is also vague. Mostly you can understand that, but not always. I was almost certain, that you can take only concealed weapons on the final Syndicate mission. Luckily I wasn't playing on Ironman...

266

Playthroughs / Re: X-Com Files Mod, Superman, Ironman-ish

« on: May 22, 2022, 05:12:53 pm »

Now that I have a bow, I will use it as well, since it trains Throwing and that requires wasting grenades otherwise.

According to the same article you mentioned about training:

Throwing Accuracy is trivial to train: each time a soldier throws any object, they will get a Throwing Accuracy action. If you're positive to have killed the last alien, have your soldiers throw away all their gear before the turn ends. Unlike all the other stats, performing Throwing Accuracy actions will not trigger secondary stat increases.

So you don't need a bow, just empty your inventory!  Probably false info, or fixed in this mod, because I don't remember gaining experience from throwing light sources...

Please, do comment.

OK.  How many "ironman-ish moments" were at this point? 28? This is more times than I reloaded during my full playthrough. But who am I to judge, I did it only on "Experienced" difficulty. (Now I am playing on Veteran.)

267

Playthroughs / Re: X-Com Files Mod, Superman, Ironman-ish

« on: May 22, 2022, 11:17:02 am »

But it exist, therefore I have to build it somewhere and try using Rats.

Oh! Rats... They are not completely useless, but sadly not worth 1 place in a craft. Maybe you will find a better application for them. Sadly, after middle game there is nothing for rats to eat...

2. The Light Pistol is for training Reactions. It is the hardest thing to train.

Yes, I notices your obsession with reaction training during your playthrough... But does it really worth the effort? Can you even feel, that agents with better reaction perform better? You see, if agents do not train their reaction by their own, it looks like it is not needed.

11 actions is the maximum that matters for training

Can you, please, tell more about that? Is this another arcane mechanics that only code readers know about?

May be on some maze like mission. With Osprey I will have enough men to have somebody carry them around.

The "funny" thing is: the more agents you have, the less is need for Position Marker. And yes, zombie maze map while you have little crafts is probably the only real application for those markers.

I don't savescum for every death or small detail, though.

E-e-h-h-h... All right, I will not comment about this...

One of the main reasons for activating ironman in the options is that it will always autosave into my save. I don't have to remember to save manually.

You can configure to save each turn in game options.

268

Playthroughs / This is awesome walkthrough!

« on: May 21, 2022, 10:38:59 pm »

Hello!

This walkthrough is amazing! And only experienced players can understand that. Your playstyle is so different from mine. I have learned so much from it. Especially about shotguns. I thought they are useless because of their short range, but you showed me how efficient they may be. Also thanks to mentioning how bullets fly from a shotgun (1 leading bullet and all other with similar direction). I didn't know that and was unable to figure it out on my own on the battlefield. Also thanks for mentioning "who yet not contributed" key combination. I wish "key combination" section in ufopedia listed all of them... And your comments! They are awesome too. So much satire about silly game mechanics and art.

I have some questions about your "adventure":

• Why have you built another prison and animal pen? I think there is no need to keep so many prisoners. You will sell them eventually. Are you afraid to sell them and not being able to research them later? But most of your inmates were easy to recapture, like low level cultist.
• Many times you brought to missions that tiny 1x1 pistol along with Desert Eagle. Why? It would be more reasonable to bring another Desert Eagle clip instead.
• Is there a reason why you bring on missions basically whole arsenal of weapons? I understand you need different weapons for different situations and additional ammo, but not so many. Looks like you just want to postpone the preparation phase (weapon distribution) to the very end. I was slightly satisfied when this pile of armaments blown up eventually. You were asking for it for a long time.
• Are you planning to use "Position Marker" somehow? I find this lamppost completely useless. If only this thing was throwable like a grenade...

I wish that RNG-goddess where nice to you during your future combats. By the way, do you regret enabling "Ironman mod"? In either case, know, that you have one more follower on this thread!

269

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 2.4: Flesh and Circuitry

« on: May 16, 2022, 07:08:02 pm »

I searched for "psi formula" and immediately got this: https://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php/Psionic_Equations

Thanks for link. So X-COM Files only changed formula for psi defense and added requirement for vision? Hmmm... Maybe Skulljack is not so useless after all...

Well, it probably helps, but I wouldn't say it's necessary... I don't do this when playing other X-com mods, and I'm doing fine. To each their own.

I really want to understand the place of each item in this mod. Some items have very narrow niche. This is where calculations are necessary.

I honestly think that this particular point should be discussed on the level of OXCE. (I do not have any strong beliefs here myself.)

Oh, sorry, since I rediscovered X-COM recently I am still not sure what is a part of OXCE and what is part of the mod.

In darkness.

Actually I usually storm outposts at night. But I use Trace Flares. My experience of fighting in darkness at close range: it is suicide!

270

The X-Com Files / Re: Accuracy Modifiers & Dropoff

« on: May 15, 2022, 10:30:06 pm »

Attached is a test save, try to shoot the alien on the other side of the map.

WOW! Mindblowing!  Never seen that before and I played a lot. Next step is to repeat this in my walkthrough, I guess.

Sadly, you either remember wrong (we all do), or you were very lucky back then.

Seriously, I don't know what to think now. I very well remember how I trained a monster-aquanaut, that was able to 100% hit with Sonic Canon, initially with aimed shot, eventually with snap shot. And I terrorized with him aliens until T'leth mission. And he never missed, really! Jungle episode I mentioned earlier also was not a single event. This was at time when there were no limit of how high soldiers stats can go... May be someone hacked my game...

May I exploit your kindness more and ask slightly unrelated question? What is wrong with shotguns in X-COM files? If a shotgun fires 7 bullets at once and there is 50% success chance, I expect, that at least 3 bullets hit the target, but in reality it is way less. So what exactly means success hit chance for scattered ammunition? I know, there is one stat in "more info" section about bullet spreading, but I can't figure out what that actually means...