[COMPILATION] Final Mod Pack (FMP)

[Arthanor]

Maybe there needs to be a "knight armor" in the FMP, which protects better but restricts vision too much to be good for shooting (ie -firing accuracy), so that soldiers can walk up to enemies to melee them and have a chance to survive?

Or a ninja outfit which boosts reaction/TUs/stamina (to help with walking up to hit things and avoiding reaction fire) but highly diminishes the amount a soldier can carry, meaning they can take a sword and not much more.

Half serious, but the idea of doing melee in power suits (especially with the -TUs from the FMP) seems weird, so a branch of melee dedicated armors could be interesting.

[Meridian]

Btw. what does the miss on melee even represent?

You can't actually miss from point blank, can you? It could represent a chance of aliens using some advanced close combat self defense techniques... but unless they were trained by Chuck Norris himself, an average rookie should still land 80-90% of the hits in my opinion.

The damage is of course another story... I agree a normal combat knife should not hurt a Muton at all (it should hit though! and cause 0 damage)... but a plasma blade? I hope Plasma Sword will be better... I mean unless you have another sword to block the attack (and you are attacked from the front side), there's no way on Earth you can avoid being hit, right?

[Arthanor]

I guess that's part of the abstraction of turn based combat? There's no way someone would stand there and look straight as you walk all the way around him to hit him in the back. As a fencer, I can say it's much harder to land a telling blow on somebody than it seems like, especially as the game "tricks your perception" and displays him standing still looking away.

If melee always had 100% to hit, it would work better representing what we actually see on the screen, but it would be a pretty poor system. It is a lot easier to dodge a sword than a bullet, and I guess that's what melee misses represent. Your opponent dodged your attack, not because they're great, but because you're not great at using that weapon. As a soldier becomes more skilled, that chance to be dodged will become smaller, as it should.

[Meridian]

Yes, turn-based abstraction is probably a valid argument.

Still, if I charge full frontal, they should reaction-fire at me and kill me... if I sneak from behind... well they shouldn't even know what hit them.

[Dioxine]

I have a lot of experience in melee playing Piratez, and it's absurdly easy to perform a back attack - and in 75% of cases, the "back attack" goes like this: you run up from the front, relying on much higher TU reserve than the victim to buff your effective Reactions compared to theirs, then you pass the victim, turn around and hit them in the back. Not much of a sneak attack

And melee no longer provokes Reactions - it did when Warboy first tackled Melee, but then somehow it was removed. Now you can murder people in plain sight and no-one will Reaction-Fire you. Not neccessarily a bad thing, too - at least you know you're guaranteed to attack without retribution, but worth bearing in mind when balancing melee weapons.

[Arthanor]

Then you take one step and *dakka dakka* *pew pew* *fwoosh* *BANG* as that triggers reaction fire from all the witnesses. But at least you got the bugger before they took you down

Also, it is indeed almost always worth attacking from the back for armored targets. Those extra steps cost about one swing but reward you with much lower armor. It's a lot easier to exploit armor weaknesses in melee than when firing, something I try to avoid doing by just walking up to my enemy, because it makes no sense to land all your blows in the back (and the AI doesn't do that, it hits you from wherever was closer, so it's unfair too).

[Solarius Scorch]

Maybe there needs to be a "knight armor" in the FMP, which protects better but restricts vision too much to be good for shooting (ie -firing accuracy), so that soldiers can walk up to enemies to melee them and have a chance to survive?

Or a ninja outfit which boosts reaction/TUs/stamina (to help with walking up to hit things and avoiding reaction fire) but highly diminishes the amount a soldier can carry, meaning they can take a sword and not much more.

You've been playing too much Piratez lately.
But seriously, while these are interesting concepts, the FMP's goal is to expand on the existing scope of the game without changing it too much. That's why most changes are mostly "more of the same stuff" than "new mechanics". This sort of thing sometimes seep through though, like the plasma blades.

Half serious, but the idea of doing melee in power suits (especially with the -TUs from the FMP) seems weird, so a branch of melee dedicated armors could be interesting.

But in reality, power suits are not that good for melee, because they're slow. I could give them penalties to Melee Accuracy too, though for now I've considered this unnecessary.

Btw. what does the miss on melee even represent?

You can't actually miss from point blank, can you? [...]

Well... That's the issue with games in general, at least those who use some sort of attack roll and Armour Class system. It's abstracted. Yes, there are many combat factors in melee, like dodging, manoeuvres, armour (the kind that deflects blows to the side rather than stop them), and so on. X-Com, and FMP, are not games about melee, so I don't think a very deep system is necessary here. Arthanor's and Dioxine's comments are also quite spot-on.
What could be improved upon is the accuracy not dependent on the target's stats, but it can only be remedied with OpenXCom Extended - by increasing chances to hit in melee and balancing it with Dodge values that differ between races and ranks. But FMP is a mod for vanilla and it'll stay that way, at least until I start working on FMP 2.0 (The X-Com Files).

[Meridian]

OK, I tried it again on fresh game and used guys with 65-70 melee stat... the results were... decent... probably still not better than firing aimed shots with minimum firing accuracy (40), but decent enough to consider using it. I will give it a try next time I play FMP.

Btw. sorry for thread-jacking, I just realized this doesn't really belong here.

[Arthanor]

You've been playing too much Piratez lately.
But seriously, while these are interesting concepts, the FMP's goal is to expand on the existing scope of the game without changing it too much. That's why most changes are mostly "more of the same stuff" than "new mechanics". This sort of thing sometimes seep through though, like the plasma blades.

But in reality, power suits are not that good for melee, because they're slow. I could give them penalties to Melee Accuracy too, though for now I've considered this unnecessary.

Haha, yes And I specifically mentioned power suits, everybody knows power armor is the awesome. Was just thinking of ways to tweak a power suit into something that's more suited for melee: Either more protective or faster variants. The FMP power suits, as you say, are not quite good for melee, but you can't really walk up to aliens in personal armor either..

[Solarius Scorch]

OK, I tried it again on fresh game and used guys with 65-70 melee stat... the results were... decent... probably still not better than firing aimed shots with minimum firing accuracy (40), but decent enough to consider using it. I will give it a try next time I play FMP.

Yes, melee weapons are intended as secondary at best. I'm happy to hear they have some limited use.

Btw. sorry for thread-jacking, I just realized this doesn't really belong here.

Why? This is exactly the kind of feedback I'm looking for! Don't worry!

Haha, yes And I specifically mentioned power suits, everybody knows power armor is the awesome. Was just thinking of ways to tweak a power suit into something that's more suited for melee: Either more protective or faster variants. The FMP power suits, as you say, are not quite good for melee, but you can't really walk up to aliens in personal armor either..

You'd be surprised

Looking for a melee-oriented armour? There's already one: Synthsuit. I'm planning an advanced version with better protection, but I need to make/find the sprites.

[Meridian]

Plasma swords + two guys with melee 52 and 59.
Attempts: 8
Hits: 8
Kills: 8

That's more like it!

EDIT: one question too... AWACS and SKYRANGER have both fuel capacity of 1500, but AWACS can stay in the air for 5.0 days, whereas SKYRANGER only 1.5 days... how should I interpret the numbers?

[Solarius Scorch]

Plasma swords + two guys with melee 52 and 59.
Attempts: 8
Hits: 8
Kills: 8

That's more like it!

Haha, congrats!

EDIT: one question too... AWACS and SKYRANGER have both fuel capacity of 1500, but AWACS can stay in the air for 5.0 days, whereas SKYRANGER only 1.5 days... how should I interpret the numbers?

Well... AWACS is lighter and carries no load?

[Meridian]

Yeah, but isn't the ufopedia entry for fuel capacity sort of pointless then? If I can't compare them... I know it is another story for elerium-fueled craft, but at least craft with same fuel type could have some logical numbers

[Dioxine]

It is logical. Flight Time = Fuel Capacity / Speed. Speed is either full or half (when in Patrol mode). Simple. When Speed is below 100, craft burns no fuel at all (at least if it's jet fuel craft, Elerium craft burn at lower rate afaik).

[methius]

Hi!

< Almost obligatory thanks for both OpenXCom and this fantastic mod pack! />

I'm having a blast, but would like to report two crashes.

Info

• Git version: openxcom_git_master_2015_10_10_0133.zip
• Game was started with "Final Mod" and the following "vanilla mods": "Aliens pick up weapons", "XcomUtil: Starting Defensive Improved Base", "XcomUtil - Statstrings"
• Game uses the UFO EU DOS data pack.

Terror Mission Crash

I'm getting a crash during the alien turn on the attached map.
The crash seems to occur right after a unit opens a door. (SFX heard playing)

• Crash upon pressing end turn if save scumming is disabled, randomly if enabled.
• All vanilla mods were disabled before entering terror mission.
• This is early in the game, first terror mission.
• Game uses the UFO EU DOS data pack.

Base Purchase Screen
In the base purchase screen an item named "XCOM" is listed for $0.
If I try to purchase it, the game crashes.