I wish I could call airstrikes down.

[MrFrustrated]

I wish I could call airstrikes down. While it wouldn't be possible in the final mission or base defense/attack missions, it would be nice to know if I encountered sectopods and didn't have the means to harm them, I could paint it with a cruise missile, get the lock, and fire away. Even better, I wish interceptors could be paired with skyrangers, giving players the ability to call in an immediate airstrike. Vehicle weapons are far more powerful than handheld weapons. The alien fusion ball is the only hand weapon that can blow a whole through alien ship hull. The ship version can blow up small and medium ufos in 1 shot. Clearly blowing up is more powerful than blowing a small hole. A simple stingray missile would likely translate 280-490 explosive attack.

Also, I think many players would get a good laugh calling on airstrikes during a terror mission.

[The Reaver of Darkness]

In UNEXCOM you can call airstrikes in the battlescape.

[MrFrustrated]

That's awesome

[FireStarTracer]

haven't played UNEXCOM yet (plan to!) but this could be.. interesting in some mods.   Take X-Piratez.   280-490 would And given that 280-490 would be in the range of a baby nuke (or worse).... yeah.  I could see definite downsides to that.   You might need something like a 'jammer' that enables opponents that increased the odds of the attack to 'miss' or perhaps reduce damage (it lands further away, and fewer people are in the kill/casaulty radius... unless its cluster munitions.)

You could also see certain UFOs or other craft (say using VLS) using 'point defense' missiles in an offensive role during missions (something like the US Navy Sea Sparrow on their destroyers) as a form of impromptu artilley.

If we extended the point defense analogy further you could assume that craft can also mount some 'point defense' turrets that might double as antipersonnel weapons.   The 40K mod and X-Piratez have vehicles that come with turrets and your bases (and enemy bases) can have turret defenses.   That might offer some protection during deployment (like assault) for your own people but it would also change the dynamics of assaulting targets (bases and larger UFOs especially.)  And a new way to proliferate both more explosions and higher casualty counts.

[shinr]

On a related topic, is it possible to mod a function for X-COM crafts to bomb the downed UFOs/USOs if they have ammo left?