Messages

16

The X-Com Files / Re: Nations stop funding - Defeat

« on: November 08, 2022, 06:59:06 pm »

I was thinking if some sort of "favour with the council" as resource type could be used as very limited way to prevent game overs from game fucking you over, i had few campaigns that could have been lost with no fault of my own because the game kept throwing me crap missions with low point rewards, bunch of negative events, some missions i couldnt even fathom playing (Depthpocalypse) with my current gear or simply missions not spawning enough or my favourite one, the Jarhead factory that has a penalty as if you ignored a terror mission. I had to resolve it by loading a way earlier save to prevent a softlock of the campaign.

Like to explain what i mean as resource type, reaching promotions 1, 2 and 3, solving major plot arcs could get you a item you could redeem in the engineering (or just research) that would simply give you reputation points with the council, so if you had particularly bad months with no way to solve it, you could burn through your favors to pass the month and carry on. Make the way to get favour with Council to be super rare you player cant just slack off for multiple months and can only use it in most dire circumstances.

I know research, or dossiers, or maybe both do work like this that they give you a trickle of points you can use to keep above water, but these numbers are very low and you need to spend scientists in mass to make any difference. And the research giving you a big point boost that can change the ratings wouldnt be new actually, i use the Metamorph research as that, given it gives you a really thick point rewards and you can actually see how much it gives you. So i save that research for the most dire months to keep above water.




 

17

The X-Com Files / Re: Nations stop funding - Defeat

« on: November 06, 2022, 05:20:05 pm »

I dont actually mind the RNG events that much as it keeps me from doing the bare minimum to get a pass from the council, it taught me to, just in case, do a few missions more than i would do normally.
But the penalties being based on difficulty is not true
I pulled up the alien deployments ini to see all the mission penalties

Terror missions are very hard AND it has a large penalty for ignoring it, but i can understand this one given its a total PR nightmare

Reptilian assassination squad is hard mission (because its a concealed equipment only against enemies armed with weapons that will kill your agents in one hit aka gauss weapons) and you cant bring real weapons here to solve the problem with superior firepower. Has high penalty

Jarhead factory has as much of a penalty as ignoring a terror mission

Cyberweb missions entirely have really low score penalties and cyberweb isnt difficult and some of this, like missing missions about whole factories cyberweb has has like a penalty of -50, yet ignoring a Jarhead factory is negative 1000 slap, the first mission about cyberweb has despawn penalty of 20, despite having 1 humanoid enemy and some rando drones Blackops weapons will crush with no issues, the only caveat to that mission is that terrain generation can fuck you over but you will probably have dynamite and the mission has the manners to actually warn you beforehand that they might be needed.

Some Hybrid missions have really low despawn penalties even if they are super easy (Talking about non-hybrid bases, those are hard) ever since Advent clinics have been yeeted (That, while they were present, were super hard and had massive penalty to boot) Hybrid farm has penalty of 50, yet who is stationed here is barely fuckall with crap weapons that wont even dent your tactical suit plating. Hybrid purge has despawn penalty of 10, yet its another snooze fest of nobodies getting strewn across the field by blackops weapons, Chemtrails site has penalty of 120, despite being super easy AND being a bad thing for XCOM mission in general.
Alien Hybrid storage, penalty of negative 10

Barn of gore, human enemies armed with crap weapons with no armor and in low number, penalty of 100

Really if anything to say, i originally thought that penalties were entirely based on how politically damaging the event is to XCOM if it came to pass, but alas, its only half truth.

18

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 2.6: Paranormal Activity

« on: November 05, 2022, 01:05:22 pm »

I have to say I am very impressed with this game. It is brilliantly thought out. I'm getting hammered though. Sometimes I wonder if there is something wrong with my difficulty level   
But over all I'm really enjoy it a lot.

At first I was turned off by the contrast levels in this game (a lot of darkness). But now I realize it actually adds to the mystique of game. Allowing other features to play a part. Amazing work.

You hopefully do know that there is a nightvision in the game, i originally thought so too, but not being able to see the terrain completely and where you are going or if you are going to accidentally fall down a high ground to some pit made me reconsider this aproach. By default it should be mapped to the SCROLL button, next to printscreen, pressing spacebar also temporially lights up the map as long as you hold it. This is only for you though, the nightvision doesnt apply to your agents, just the commander, they still will have a short detection radius depending on their night vision range.

19

The X-Com Files / Re: Nations stop funding - Defeat

« on: November 02, 2022, 07:18:21 pm »

You my friend are a life saver.

I'm going through the exact same thing as the OP. So glad I found this thread. I didn't know the research would negatively effect the score (get me all those -300 warning points).

Love this game, I just couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong.

Researching something doesnt directly give you negative score with the exception of MAGMA deals, given you arent far enough in the mod, MAGMA is a Russian weapons and tech manufacturer and it will trade with XCOM, they generally provide hard hitting weapons that are heavy to carry and use, but hit hard as a truck. As you research advanced tech, MAGMA will send you offers for their exclusive merchandize in offer for alien tech, if you do give them what they want, you instantly get hit by a score penalty and for the rest of the game, random, negative events will pop up from time to time, so its nessesary to pay extra vigiliance and do one extra job to keep the council happy if you happen to get hit by one of these events.

The other thing is, while this is metagaming of the highest degree, but researching new "story arcs" opens up new missions (And negative events) that will start spawning until you resolve the WHOLE arc, opening up...too many cans of worms can lead to you being overwhelmed with missions, this can be both good and bad (Alot of oportunities for good score, experience and loot, but your own sanity and your soldiers life is at risk) but some of the missions and the gear required to completely resolve it are two completely different tech levels.

For example, the Shogg Arc
You initiate it by investigating caves and discover that there is a underground world waiting to get explored, once you get the first research, from top of my head, 3 missions will start spawning, you can get this thing pretty much around promotion 3, by the time, you will be lucky you have the tactical heavy armor for most of your troops (This is an advanced infantry armor that has the bulk required to withstand most firearms without being scratched, once you get this, anti-cult missions will become super easy because only high caliber weapons can even hope to scratch your dudes).
So, you have your metalic armor, blackops weapons and then you start getting these missions

1) Raid
Underground craft spawns in a village  with a squad of aliens, armed with gauss weapons, that will one hit KO your soldiers from frontal hit from full HP unless they roll for ULTRA low damage (The weakest gauss weapon hits for 80 dmg) Gauss Weapons are strongest kinetic weapons in the game and they are meant to be used against things like.... tanks and power armor. Not people.

2) Depthpocalypse
Avoid at any cost, do not, this is mission with difficulty worthy of end game gear, extremely heavily armoured enemies, lots of them and all armed with hard hitting weapons, this is pretty much terror mission by the time you dont even have laser weapons.

3) Croc Assassination
How about the Raid, but instead, you can only take concealed equipment.


There is a silver lining though, the gauss weapons and a new resource type you can get from these missions (esp the raids that are the easier thing here) can be used by humans if you just run these weapons thru research, so if you can bite it down, you can get access to extremely hard hitting weapons relatively early on, you just cant make ammo for it and the raids will be your main source.

And these missions are just the surface of opening this story arc, there is alot more here, but you shall see it for yourself.

20

The X-Com Files / Re: Nations stop funding - Defeat

« on: October 31, 2022, 01:43:23 pm »

Bad events happen from either ignoring missions and letting them expire, or waiting too long with research (Like cult networks)

Though, one pure bullshit thing is that the cult apprehensions have a penalty of 200 points if you ignore them and you only get 10 points if you capture targets alive, any deaths from your guys means negative score.

Meaning ignoring 1 cultist apprehension is equivalent in doing 20, successful, casualty less ones.
And these missions dont spawn once per month, but multiple times.

I have attached the modified txt file to this post if you want it the simplest way. It changes all cult apprehencion penalties from negative 200 to 10
Just replace the file in Mods/XcomFiles/Ruleset
(Alien deployment)

21

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 2.6: Paranormal Activity

« on: October 29, 2022, 11:52:53 am »

Thank you for the info.
Will the game still end (like X com) with 2 consecutive months of poor ratings ?

I also haven't figured out a way to increase research yet. Probably holding me back. Need more lab space but it looks like only one X com HQ is available per base so far. Maybe I need to create multiple bases.

Yeah, 2 months in a row means game over. You will unlock better labs (Like intel lab), your number of scientist will grow but it will take some time and for some time, it will be quite gradual (Like +5 scientists).
Having more than 1 base will be a dream till you get to promo 3, given you wont be able to finance 2 functional bases without the promo 3 income boost and UFO loot selling.

22

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 2.6: Paranormal Activity

« on: October 28, 2022, 08:10:20 pm »

Been really enjoying the latest version of this. Have a good feeling I'm going to have to restart and play again though, I'm getting a lot of -300 points pop up messages. I'm trying to figure out what I'm doing wrong, looks like I'll have to dig deeper into what I'm doing wrong.

Great ideas and great game play.

Aside from RNG or by sharing tech to MAGMA, event penalties occur for slacking off and making missions expire, or having active story arcs you havent resolved yet.

23

The X-Com Files / Re: How does one Fight the Flying Avatar Lady?

« on: October 28, 2022, 08:08:27 pm »

I always soften her up with shotguns till i see the shield has dropped, i assume you want her alive to get to Lotus HQ. So you have options

1) Taser cannon has the range, but is very bulky
2) Tasers have low range and might require alot of attacks
3) Dart rifles, if you have them, they have the range but lackluster attack power against humanoids.
4) Stun shells for the shotgun has medium range, but does low stun damage per hit.

The Avatar otherwise has shield you need to drop, it can absorb some damage, so just focus fire her.

24

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 2.6: Paranormal Activity

« on: October 25, 2022, 09:12:34 pm »

Can someone tell me how high reaction values numbers fly on with rare npcs like Gertrud or Master Wo ?

This is third turn of doing this and not even one agent is capable of landing even a single hit, i had to send someone to get the knockout grenades.
I tried bashing her with fists in case of Gertrude being somehow invincible towards electric damage but alas i had to resort to gas.

25

The X-Com Files / Which deals with MAGMA are actually worth it

« on: October 25, 2022, 04:17:46 pm »

There are bunch of these, aside from their standard product sales that carry no penalties for accessing them, MAGMA can provide heavy weapons for XCOM, but can also trade with XCOM for much more specialized equipment, these deals come with a massive hit to your score, permament bad events further tanking your score for the rest of the campaign and also missions that exist due to XCOM trading the tech.

What is also bizzare is that you can share/tell them to fuck off about sharing tech you have no way of actually making, you can give them access to alien gardens, but you dont even have pulse weapons, so you give them something with negative 1500 points + slander events for fuckall.

So lets list them

1) Tritanium ammo share
- Prior to earlier versions of the mod, was way easier to access and benefit from
2) Alien Garden share
- Completely useless without the pulse rifle tech
3) Elerium battery share
- Completely useless without terramite share
4) Terramite share
- Completely useless without the battery share
5) Elerium explosives
- Only one product, at the point where you have elerium explosives, you probably have bigger explosives already.

26

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 2.6: Paranormal Activity

« on: October 23, 2022, 10:56:00 pm »

I go for my first apprehension, and I start exploring the place with my two agents (equipped with Glock and stun baton). With playing casually I mean that I'm not employing any advanced tactics, but I'm not making my agents run around like headless chickens either. Rng has one of them sniped from halfway across the map, from the side he wasn't looking at; the other one reaches the cultist and attacks twice with the baton, hitting once - not enough, the bad guy turns around and shivs her to death.
One save-scum later, the cultist is safely arrested and I go on: I interrogate him, arrest several more, get a van, all in all I'm starting to make a little progress, until I get hit by two -300 events about the cults still being elusive. Then, between days 15 and 21 of the first month, such events fire two more times, with three additional negative score hits from different happenings (the missed crop circles, the CIA, and I can't remember which other); I haven't counted how many events I got in total, but my score is below -1500 since my missions can't even remotely compensate, and research is only slightly making up for those random losses.

The begining is extremely hard, you really need to do as many missions as possible. Make sure to research logistics with upmost priority because that gives you a van (Which can carry 4 soldiers).
It doesnt help that the Cult apprehenction, which spawns alot, has negative 200 penalty if you ignore it. And if you complete it by capping cultists, without losing people you get like 10 or 12 points.
For cult appreh. in particular, you should do this at night (van can wait if you order it to patrol on the spot, van has infinite fuel so it can wait), because humans have awful eye sight at night so its actually possible for you to get to melee/shotgun range without having to dodge bullets across the street.

Researching shotguns (Its under the non-standard weapons research topic) is also SUPER important, not only shotgun completely destroys most humans (and animals) in one or two hits and reasonable range, most importantly, they can fire stun ammo, your first medium range stun weapon, it has the benefit that enemies cant dodge it if they get hit (Also that you can simply stand outside of their melee range) melee weapons can be dodged on top of just failing to land on the enemy so in the early game, melee weapons are very unreliable (But later on, they can be really strong)

The 200 point penalty is quite ludicrous, but Solarius has already spoken about it staying that way to really hammer down that XCOM is a joke at the start of the game and the council looks at every oportunity to shut you down. So you have mission, that spawns alot, has large penalty and if you fuck up in any way in it, it will get you negative score.

Expect to have few failed campaigns, alot of this is trial and error. If you have more specific questions, we can always answer it.

27

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 2.6: Paranormal Activity

« on: October 23, 2022, 10:03:23 pm »

I have been playing x-files for some time now and I am very impressed with storyline and presentation. It is really great and atmospheric. A lot of effort was put into this and it shows! However, there is imho unnecessary difficulty all over the place (e.g., too many manors turning the world into MiG alley and when you try to take out the manors there are enemy reinforcements spawning right next to your peeps killing them without any chance to react). Balancing seems off, because at the same time you get missions where you fight 1 (one) zombie. The only way to win this game seems to rush certain techs and huge amounts of grinding. This makes it very hard for the more casual gamer to enjoy the story and explore the game world.

Here is a dirty trick, the reinforcements spawning is completely RNG, just save at the end of your each turn and save scum your way through it. I dont mind the concept of reinforcements but this early it feels really cheap to have squad of soldiers randomly spawning behind your squads and shooting them in the back. The missions are already dauting for early game.
If like reinforcements came every eight or tenth turn, then it would be atleast better in a way you know when its time to position your soldiers with walls behind them.

28

The X-Com Files / Re: [submod] Leeroys!

« on: October 16, 2022, 12:03:33 pm »

Oh i like this already, one of my grudges is that creature hunts are quite boring beyond like year 1, because it boils down to Napoleon war style firing lines of soldiers, against enemies that are stumbling randomly while they are getting picked off one by one. I like how zombies were changed to charge you, not only it makes missions shorter (Which is probably the biggest factor, too many enemies that often are hiding somewhere, but its too risky to go and explore given most creatures can destroy your agents in melee, even with decent armor so its back to firing lines), it also is the perfect scenario for short ranged weapons. When its zombie slaying time, i just give every single soldier a shotgun, because everything will be at shotgun range eventually.

I know i will regret activating this mod at some point, probably will have it innactivate for early game and activate it mid game onward.

29

The X-Com Files / Re: The X-Com Files - 2.6: Paranormal Activity

« on: October 11, 2022, 06:49:51 pm »

One thing i noticed (After like.... 5-6 campaigns of this mod) in armoured vests description, it says it provides protection against shrapnel and explosives, but it doesnt actually do the latter, it has no concussive protection.

30

The X-Com Files / Re: How do you complete manors?

« on: May 24, 2022, 08:38:29 pm »

By the time manors start spawning, you should have armoured vest already or be really close to getting one (which doesnt protect against explosives, despite what description says, no concussive resistance) and if you are lucky, carapace plate which does lower concussive damage caused by most explosives and probably a Dragonfly atleast if not Osprey so you can send in a sizeable attack force. Predeploy smoke in your loadout at turn 1 so you are covered the moment the game starts and spread out.

You should have BlackOps weapons by this time so some assault rifles, shotguns and if you have some mines from doing raids, minelay all exits from buildings. The armoured cars are (Red Dawn) bit of a problem, they also prevent surrender of living enemies as long as they are alive. Miniguns would chew through their armor eventually, otherwise, incendiary grenades should be used. Armoured Cars take abit more piercing damage done by balistic weapons, however rifles wont do it.... a sniper rifle hit from the back however... or even better, if you have Berret Sniper Rifle then use that to crack it in few hits.
If you happen to get an RPG from Red Dawns safehouses, then yeah, rocket launcher will bitchslap them x4.

You do want to get rid of the manors as they will evolve and eventually will be a staging ground for Migs that will give you quite the hell on geoscape and good luck trying to fight them with just a Humvee that can barely take one in 1v1. And i do need to remind you that most transport crafts are unarmed and Migs are well... jets and will catch Ospreys and other VTOL aircraft and they come in groups btw (3 ?). Like the first craft that can reliably take 3v1 is either Kitsune or Raven (Interceptor is risky and using your own Mig is a waste of money) and Migs arent even the worst thing that can spawn from cult bases, those are atleast man made aircraft  so they have paper thin armor and standard weapons.

One way to assault such manors is to send a fast decoy ahead, aggro the migs and return to base and the Migs will do a sweep before returning to base and refueling and in that time, your infantry transport can slip in.