Author Topic: Soldier Diaries Inconsistencies With Mind Control (MC) [RESOLVED]  (Read 2705 times)

Offline Countdown

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So it could be debatable whether these issues are "bugs" so I thought it best to start a discussion and ask first rather than putting in a "bug report". I've been testing soldier diaries in the latest nightly and have noticed some real inconsistencies and a possible bug when it comes to mind control.

- Death Counts: First, death counts are counted in three separate spots and each seems to be applied differently. If you kill an alien that is under XCOM mind control, it will count as a kill in the soldier's main profile screen (where it lists mission counts, TU, stamina, etc), his main "combat" diary screen (with all the tallies on the bottom) and on the mission report screen (when you click on the individual missions). However, if you MC an alien, and have that alien kill another alien, it will not count on the profile screen, but will count on the diary screen and the mission report screen. If you have an MCed alien kill another MCed alien, it will not count as a kill on the profile screen or diary screen, but will on the mission screen.

I think three different kill counts all following a different rule is confusing and illogical. Whether you count it as a kill or not is up for debate, but I think it should be applied consistently rather than counting some places, but not others. Even weirder, if you have an alien commit suicide with a grenade it will sometimes (but not consistently) count as a kill on the diary screen even though the alien was under your control when it died. (In contrast, shooting an alien under XCOM control doesn't add a kill to the diary screen.)

- "Neutralizations": Wasn't sure what was going on at first with this, but realized if you MC an alien, it counts as 1 "neutralization" whether or not that alien ever dies. Makes sense on one level, but if you MC 3 aliens and have them all kill themselves, should that really count as 6 "neutralizations"? There isn't a right or wrong answer, I'm just posing the question.

- Bug? This last part is the "bug". I can't figure out a pattern, but sometimes a different soldier randomly gets credit for another soldier's MC kill(s). In the save attached, if soldier #2 MCs the snakeman and has it kill itself with the grenade in its hand (just prime and drop from inventory screen), soldier #4 strangely will get the credit for the kill. If any other soldier does the same thing, they will get credit for the kill as they should.

I've tested this a bit and even had it happen where one soldier's MCed alien took out itself and two other MCed aliens with a single grenade, but a totally different soldier got credit for all three kills.
« Last Edit: April 04, 2016, 07:34:38 pm by Countdown3 »

Offline Countdown

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Re: Soldier Diaries Inconsistencies With Mind Control (MC)
« Reply #1 on: March 07, 2016, 01:27:14 pm »
Some possible fixes:

First option: A soldier only gets a "kill" if he kills an alien with his own weapon. Keep the "panic" and "MC" counts the same on the combat diary screen, but if you MC an alien and that alien kills itself or other aliens it doesn't count as a "kill" in any of the three spots. That's probably the simplest solution.

Second option: If you MC an alien and have it kill itself or other aliens (regardless of whether or not those other aliens were also being MCed) apply that kill for the soldier in all three of their kill counts (main profile, diary and mission report). Probably more complicated to fix, but would be consistent across the board and IMO the best option.


PS - I'll end with a positive note and emphasize that I think this is a really cool addition to the game and I certainly have a lot of respect for the painstaking effort that must have gone into putting it together. And I recognize that MC is a confusing aspect of the game and calculating kill stats for it is not a black and white issue. I know this used to be a separate mod and my understanding is it only relatively recently became part of the main build, so it's 100% understandable that there would still be some kinks to work out, if you do in fact agree that the above issues are kinks.
« Last Edit: March 07, 2016, 01:29:20 pm by Countdown3 »