aliens

Author Topic: New types of alien bases - manufacturing bases and all  (Read 7761 times)

Offline kharille

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New types of alien bases - manufacturing bases and all
« on: November 27, 2013, 03:09:34 pm »
Those aliens are making bases for a purpose.  Way I see it, we get so many heavy plasma guns, where are they coming from?  Surely the aliens will have dedicated cloning facilities for sectoids, reaper breeding pens and chryssalid hives, maybe even with some kind of chryssalid queen...

Just a thought.  Imagine hitting their manufacturing base, and next you know you're up against aliens equipped with ..  pointy wooden sticks....

Offline myk002

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Re: New types of alien bases - manufacturing bases and all
« Reply #1 on: November 27, 2013, 07:17:25 pm »
interesting in concept, but there might be some unresolved lore issues -- finding a manufacturing base implies that the base existed before xcom started building bases of their own.  In-game, however, bases are constructed as part of the "infiltration" workflow.  Having some variety in what we find in a base would be a welcome change, I think, but it's hard to justify crippling the alien invasion just because a newly-established base is destroyed...

Offline shinr

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Re: New types of alien bases - manufacturing bases and all
« Reply #2 on: November 28, 2013, 01:04:16 am »
How about TFTD-style 2-parter bases, with 3-parter Cydonia, for those who want a challenge?

On the other hand. TFTD itself could use 1-parter lower-risk lower-reward "outposts" for a change of pace.

Offline Svanh

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Re: New types of alien bases - manufacturing bases and all
« Reply #3 on: November 28, 2013, 01:43:13 am »
How about TFTD-style 2-parter bases, with 3-parter Cydonia, for those who want a challenge?

On the other hand. TFTD itself could use 1-parter lower-risk lower-reward "outposts" for a change of pace.

A good idea. I'd love to be able to mod in more complex deployments than "crash UFO, loot crash site".

If you make some more base map tiles and add them to the ruleset you should be able to get a bit more variety in alien bases.

Offline Solarius Scorch

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Re: New types of alien bases - manufacturing bases and all
« Reply #4 on: January 13, 2014, 04:05:55 pm »
An excellent idea. While I understand that the alien invasion cannot rely on the bases entirely, I still think that they are being built for a reason. I have always assumed they somehow mattered as production centres, based on all the equipment we could find, and not just food stores with a nice penthouse for the commander.
Still, I don't really think that making specialised bases (agricultural base, weapon forge base etc.) would lore-friendly. What I would like to see is more diverse equipment/rooms, with clearer purpose (by how they look like or if researched).

Offline kharille

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Re: New types of alien bases - manufacturing bases and all
« Reply #5 on: January 13, 2014, 10:38:46 pm »
Maybe cloning or spawning bases.  With increased alien activity, you'd think they would have created reaper farms and sectoid cloning labs.  Or some kind of Chryssalid hive....

Offline Solarius Scorch

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Re: New types of alien bases - manufacturing bases and all
« Reply #6 on: January 13, 2014, 11:31:09 pm »
Maybe cloning or spawning bases.  With increased alien activity, you'd think they would have created reaper farms and sectoid cloning labs.  Or some kind of Chryssalid hive....

Exactly what I have in mind! Some more ideas include:
- Cloning facilities: large, heavy duty cloning vats to breed Mutons and Chryssalids, as well as smaller vats for Sectoids and Floaters. Embryonic, half-formed aliens can be visible inside.
- Industrial-sized surgery rooms (using similar or the same equipment as the Abductor) for installing all those cybernetics in freshly bred Mutons and Floaters.
- Manufacturing plants, with suggested production lines (and perhaps some extra alien weapons/equipment to capture).
- Medical facilities, containing cloning vats (much like ones in the cloning facility above, but empty) and a monitoring computer.
- Dormitoria, where aliens spend their "free" time - when not on duty or at the entertainment station (which is a lot of time). Include casket-like "beds" (possibly filled with some fluid) and maybe feeding stations (simple machines which apply dissolved alien food to the bloodstream).
- Perhaps a human tech room, with some Earth-made equipment (for studies or some other, more mysterious purpose - supplying their human/half-human agents?).
- If we want to go a little further, UFO hangars (only for small craft for emergencies, like Commander evacuation or special assignments that come up without warning). With a functional Medium Scout or several Small Scouts inside.

Making and coding these in should be fairly easy for an experienced modder, and I think they'd add a lot to the game. Even I could give it a try, at least with the graphics. :)
« Last Edit: January 14, 2014, 02:19:47 am by Solarius Scorch »

Offline kharille

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Re: New types of alien bases - manufacturing bases and all
« Reply #7 on: January 14, 2014, 06:01:07 pm »
Reapers and Mutons requiring frequent alien harvests whereas sectoids and floaters might do more abductions.  And maybe more terror missions for snakemen, their specialty.  Some kind of alien economy would be nice. 

Offline Danny

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Re: New types of alien bases - manufacturing bases and all
« Reply #8 on: January 14, 2014, 07:49:37 pm »
Exactly what I have in mind! Some more ideas include:
- Cloning facilities: large, heavy duty cloning vats to breed Mutons and Chryssalids, as well as smaller vats for Sectoids and Floaters. Embryonic, half-formed aliens can be visible inside.
- Industrial-sized surgery rooms (using similar or the same equipment as the Abductor) for installing all those cybernetics in freshly bred Mutons and Floaters.
- Manufacturing plants, with suggested production lines (and perhaps some extra alien weapons/equipment to capture).
- Medical facilities, containing cloning vats (much like ones in the cloning facility above, but empty) and a monitoring computer.
- Dormitoria, where aliens spend their "free" time - when not on duty or at the entertainment station (which is a lot of time). Include casket-like "beds" (possibly filled with some fluid) and maybe feeding stations (simple machines which apply dissolved alien food to the bloodstream).
- Perhaps a human tech room, with some Earth-made equipment (for studies or some other, more mysterious purpose - supplying their human/half-human agents?).
- If we want to go a little further, UFO hangars (only for small craft for emergencies, like Commander evacuation or special assignments that come up without warning). With a functional Medium Scout or several Small Scouts inside.

Making and coding these in should be fairly easy for an experienced modder, and I think they'd add a lot to the game. Even I could give it a try, at least with the graphics. :)

Maybe also making alien bases unique to the race?

Sectoids would have very clean looking cloning chambers and Cyberdisk engineering rooms.
With maybe also a lot of alien entertainment.

Missions of interest: Research, Abduction and Harvest. (not limited to)

Floaters a bit more messy cloning vats with more integrated engineering rooms to add the anti-gravity device to freshly cloned Floaters.
Bigger cloning vats for reapers.

Missions of interest: Research, abduction and Terror. (not limited to)

Snakemen would have room full of eggs and artificially kept alive humans with chrysalid eggs in them maybe even some hatching during a base assault? XD
Barely any engineering rooms

Missions of interest: Abduction, Terror and Harvest. (not limited to)

Mutons alot of human body parts, alien surgery and genetic manipulation equipment. (I see the original Mutons the result of alien experiments on humans)
A lot of alien food containers as Mutons need their food to feed those muscles... ^^

Missions of interest: Abduction, Terror and Retaliation. (not limited to)

Ethereals are similar to Sectoids, with most of the entertainment replaced by unknown and mysterious psionic devices of some kind.

Missions of interest: Infiltration, Research and Retaliation. (not limited to)

Offline Solarius Scorch

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Re: New types of alien bases - manufacturing bases and all
« Reply #9 on: January 14, 2014, 11:38:37 pm »
It's an intriguing idea. I'm just not sure if alien bases are one race only by lore, or only in game mechanics. I can't see why they would keep alien races in separate bases, but we can't rule this out (except maybe Ethereals and Mutons, who are said to be closely associated via psionic link). And I don't know if it can be implemented at all.

Well, even if we don't do this, most or all these ideas are still valid. I like this biology-related functionality.

Mutons as mutated humans are an interesting concept. Somehow I haven't thought about it before, because I'm kinda attached to this version of the story. :)

Offline Danny

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Re: New types of alien bases - manufacturing bases and all
« Reply #10 on: January 16, 2014, 08:17:34 pm »
The original game had all races separated... :\
TFTD had some mixed crew missions but not all too common. Colonies made sense as they actually needed to make all the aliens, so some hang around for defence. But even then the 2nd part was always just Lobsters and *shudder* Tentaculats...

Now I suppose some random aliens could hangout in another alienrace their base e.g. a few commanding Ethereals in a Muton base or some Mutons grunts in a Ethereal base to do some mindless grunt work. XD

Though now I'm talking about this, I think its also original lore that Silacoids were used to actually dig out bases.
So it wouldn't be too surprising to find in any of the alien bases... ^^


Well Mutons are basically big purple enhanced body builders, who got castrated, lobotomised and stuffed into a green strong spandex suit... XD