[Feedback] Changing spotter/sniper mechanics

[cevaralien]

I was playing with sniper/spotter features and i think it could be changed a little to enhance it.

Why our units are plotted in human turn and are available to be shooted at IA turn? That doesn't the way that human squad-firing is working. For the human player, the alien units are spotted in the same turn that human moves, but when that turn finish, these aliens are forgotten, if they moves to a place with no LOS.

But, if the human is spotted on his turn, no matter if they hide in no LOS for aliens, he will be shooted in IA turn. Very frustrating and cheaty, considering that many maps are mainly open-terrain, so, only smoke works as cover.

I think that spotter for IA must work on the alien turn. For example, they are moving and spot a human unit, but that unit kill the spotter with reaction fire... well, the snipers could fire beyond LOS, even if the human unit is covered by smoke.  That is like firing squad works for humans.

It is possible to do that change? I think that it must be done at the source code, but i don't know which language is used. I know python only.

[ohartenstein23]

The point of the spotter/sniper feature is not to make the AI play like a human player, but to offer the option to reduce one of the huge advantages the player has against them. Of course it's "cheaty" in some sense, there are many more "cheats" in the AI code to make them enough of a challenge.

So it's certainly possible to make that change, but as the author of the feature, I'm not going to blunt the challenge it adds just to make it more "realistic" or "fair".

[cevaralien]

Yes, in fact, without this feature, the game is more easy and "boring", but with it, it is guaranteed to lose one or more soldiers in an open terrain map, because there is no way to defend against the alien sniper. The only tactic to counteract this is sacrifice rookies. Even veterans doesn't survive. You can't shoot first with your veterans, if you have some one.

I nerfed the accuracy, but that feature negates my own snipers.

I think that activating the feature in the alien movement turn doesn't make it less challenging, because the objective of squad-firing is accomplished and the human can't do nothing if it is not his turn. It allows to better thinking about the covers and could balance better the game. But it is activated at human turn, well... it is only a carnage, no matter how well player you are, no matter what decision you take, you will be shooted if your soldier hit any alien.

Well... thanks for the receptivity. I will try to test a more extended vision to enhance the snipering and an increase of the LOS penalty.

[ohartenstein23]

The sniper AI is intended to be used with the no-LOS penalty, and I would recommend that any mod that uses the feature not use spotter values greater than 1, plus limiting the number of units marked as snipers.

For example, in 40k only a few heavy weapons enemies and vehicle turrets have the ability to snipe, usually just 1-2 units in a mission. They also typically aren't that mobile, so the player can figure out quickly where they need to take cover. Plus I wouldn't make them 100% to attempt to snipe every turn.

[cevaralien]

In my mod, all alien units could spot and snipe, only 1 turn of spot and 50% of sniper for all units expected to be outside UFOs. Commanders, Leaders and other "inner" personnel, as Engineers, have 75% of sniping.

I'm worried about the minimum distance considered as "long shot" for marksmanship commendation. If i could define the maximum view to this distance, i could use LOS penalty to reduce the "cheaty" effect, even for my soldiers. My concern are about the long shots in LOS.