[COMPILATION] Final Mod Pack (FMP)

[Meridian]

If we wanted to make it a bit more realistic, my proposal would be like this:

Dog/Scout:
----------------
- costs 60'000$ (you need to pay for the life-long professional training (before the dog was able to join xcom) and for somebody to take care of him/them during his service in xcom)... and it's still only 1.5x more than a rookie... not mentioning rookie costs you more each month
- TU: 80
- stamina: 90
- health: 25
- bravery: 80 (instead of 10... I think dogs wouldn't panic like humans... but I may be wrong)
- reactions: 70
- armour: 0 everywhere
- bite: 40 damage
- psi strength: 40


Smoke drone/Support (...yeah, anything with reactions less than 60 cannot be called a scout, ever):
----------------
- costs 1000$ (it's basically a toy, made in China) + 450$ for 3 smoke grenades = 1450$
- TU: 70
- stamina: 140
- health: 10 (it's a toy)
- bravery: 110
- reactions: 10 (it's a remotely operated toy... don't think you can react at all if something unexpected happens)
- armour: 0 everywhere
- ammo: 3 pre-primed smoke grenades (all stats like a real smoke grenade), throwing range: 1-3 tiles, cost of the "throw" 25% of TUs
- psi strength: 110

[pilot00]

I may sound like the bore of the party but: After extensive use of both of drones and dogs(and even more if we take into account Meridians proposal of equalising the smoke cloud of the drone with the grenades cloud), I kinda feel its like well....cheating. You remove some risk/reward situations/strategies of the game by simply throwing money at them, especially now with the huge reduction in price for the drone. You dont risk your men, you dont risk your HWPs because you have a cost semi-efficient way of scouting and whith the smoke grenade=drone grenade in radius we throw the grenade strategies out the window.

While I cannot with my heart in the right place advocate their complete removal (after all whoever doesnt like them simply doesnt use them), I believe the reactions reduction was a good step, however agile and small they are they still run the risk of been heard/seen, so been practicaly immune to the reaction fire is IMHO wrong.

I agree with Meridians change for the most part except the pricing of the drone and the smoke granade radius. I wont repeat the grenades consearns but I think the drone should be a price that would at least put some thought for its well beeing. 1450$ is a trivial price and with its small frame (space wise) you could load 4-5 in each mission and call it a day even all of them are destroyed, effectively spamming them and making it a no brainer. Putting 4 of them in every mission sounds a good deal to me already. Selling just one plasma weapon after each mission and you call it even (actually you make a profit too).

Just my thoughts dont any of you take personal guys

[arrakis69ct]

STR_DART_RIFLE_CLIP_B_PREQ1 can you put this lines to translate? i dont find in the ruleset

[Meridian]

You can put on only 3 on board (limit for HWP's).

My comments were not about overpowering them... they were about giving them some real use. I have to say (after good use of them) the scout tanks are at the moment (FMP 1.1.5) absolutely useless:
1. reactions (I was using them for this) are now same as average soldier... so I can just buy a soldier for much cheaper
2. smoke... is just a joke!... I have tried it again few hours ago recording episode #41... I put a smoke cloud in between me and the enemy (with maximum number of smoke tiles between us) and the enemy could just see and shoot through it without any problems... as if it wasn't there

So either make it a good scout (=good reactions) or good support (=good smoke)... otherwise it doesn't have any use in the game.

As for the price... for a good scout I am willing to pay hundreds of thousands (cost of 5-15 rookies)... for a good smoke support I am willing to pay maybe tens of thousands (max. 2 rookies price).

Of course, putting both skills on the drone is too OP... so I vote for only one of them... I don't care which.

[pilot00]

You can put on only 3 on board (limit for HWP's).

My comments were not about overpowering them... they were about giving them some real use. I have to say (after good use of them) the scout tanks are at the moment (FMP 1.1.5) absolutely useless:
1. reactions (I was using them for this) are now same as average soldier... so I can just buy a soldier for much cheaper
2. smoke... is just a joke!... I have tried it again few hours ago recording episode #41... I put a smoke cloud in between me and the enemy (with maximum number of smoke tiles between us) and the enemy could just see and shoot through it without any problems... as if it wasn't there

So either make it a good scout (=good reactions) or good support (=good smoke)... otherwise it doesn't have any use in the game.

As for the price... for a good scout I am willing to pay hundreds of thousands (cost of 5-15 rookies)... for a good smoke support I am willing to pay maybe tens of thousands (max. 2 rookies price).

Of course, putting both skills on the drone is too OP... so I vote for only one of them... I don't care which.

Well, it might be useless right now, but the very fact that you will have a unit that costs 1k to spot you the enemy location for no risk involved and even bite their bullets, is ok in my book even if it dies. And well three to four is not really a big problem

I dont feel they are overpowered in the sense. I feel just with their very existance (and this goes to dogs as well but their use is a bit more limited) is denying the risk aspect of the game. That in itself is a big (again IMHO) minus on itself. Loading them with extra stuff (like a normal gas cloud and over the board reactions) is going to remove more aspects of the game. Though again one can advocate with crappy reactions you can use them as bullet magnets, which all boils down to their low price.

At least thats my take on the subject. Dont club me for it

[yrizoud]

2. smoke... is just a joke!... I have tried it again few hours ago recording episode #41... I put a smoke cloud in between me and the enemy (with maximum number of smoke tiles between us) and the enemy could just see and shoot through it without any problems... as if it wasn't there

Smoke "thickness" is not moddable, so it's the same as produced by grenades. I'm not expert, but it seems smoke stays mostly at the level of the explosion. Floating aliens can often look down at your characters while their LOS does not cross enough smoke tiles to block sight. Same danger for your flying soldiers and HWPs, if they pop their head above the smoke they will get shot down by land aliens.

[DoxaLogos (JG)]

I agree with Meridians change for the most part except the pricing of the drone and the smoke granade radius. I wont repeat the grenades consearns but I think the drone should be a price that would at least put some thought for its well beeing. 1450$ is a trivial price and with its small frame (space wise) you could load 4-5 in each mission and call it a day even all of them are destroyed, effectively spamming them and making it a no brainer. Putting 4 of them in every mission sounds a good deal to me already. Selling just one plasma weapon after each mission and you call it even (actually you make a profit too).

I agree with the price.  It should be high.  The scouts are not chinese toys, because it's designed to military spec and probably has real good cameras on it (and grenade launcher). Anyone one working near or with government contractors (at least in U.S) pay large amounts of money to contractors for military equipment.  Current robotic technology in the U.S. military is expensive stuff.  A few years ago, 650 recon scout robots were sent to Afghanistan for 13.5 million dollars, so that comes out to about $21,000 a piece.  Those didn't have grenade launchers on them, just cameras and remote control capability.  https://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/military/story/2011-10-16/military-sends-robots-to-afghanistan-to-protect-troops/50796644/1

[Ridаn]

Smoke "thickness" is not moddable, so it's the same as produced by grenades. I'm not expert, but it seems smoke stays mostly at the level of the explosion. Floating aliens can often look down at your characters while their LOS does not cross enough smoke tiles to block sight. Same danger for your flying soldiers and HWPs, if they pop their head above the smoke they will get shot down by land aliens.

Its not about thickness really (in case of drone, not overall), but about radius, and I`m 99% sure that radius of smoke explosion is moddable.
So may be modify drone smoke pellets damage to cover 3 tiles in all general directions? It is enough for complete cover unless alien stumbles into cloud.
I`m also not sure how much of difference 3D explosions option makes, because I kept it at "2" for ever.

[pilot00]

I agree with the price.  It should be high.  The scouts are not chinese toys, because it's designed to military spec and probably has real good cameras on it (and grenade launcher). Anyone one working near or with government contractors (at least in U.S) pay large amounts of money to contractors for military equipment.  Current robotic technology in the U.S. military is expensive stuff.  A few years ago, 650 recon scout robots were sent to Afghanistan for 13.5 million dollars, so that comes out to about $21,000 a piece.  Those didn't have grenade launchers on them, just cameras and remote control capability.  https://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/military/story/2011-10-16/military-sends-robots-to-afghanistan-to-protect-troops/50796644/1

That doesnt concearn me so much (but I admit some realism is necessary), I am more concearned about throwing aspects of the game into obscurity. A steep price can help regulate that.

[Meridian]

Smoke "thickness" is not moddable, so it's the same as produced by grenades. I'm not expert, but it seems smoke stays mostly at the level of the explosion. Floating aliens can often look down at your characters while their LOS does not cross enough smoke tiles to block sight. Same danger for your flying soldiers and HWPs, if they pop their head above the smoke they will get shot down by land aliens.

For the record: it was a muton and we were both on ground level.

[Dioxine]

Its not about thickness really (in case of drone, not overall), but about radius, and I`m 99% sure that radius of smoke explosion is moddable.
So may be modify drone smoke pellets damage to cover 3 tiles in all general directions? It is enough for complete cover unless alien stumbles into cloud.
I`m also not sure how much of difference 3D explosions option makes, because I kept it at "2" for ever.

All you need is to raise explosion power to 60 to have a smoke-grenade equivalent (smoke radius scales with its "power"). I'm also pretty sure that smoke initially disperses horizontally, only later it floats up.

[arrakis69ct]

       If posible order the bases in the base screen???

Enviado desde mi GT-I9300 mediante Tapatalk

[Solarius Scorch]

Version 1.2 is online.

• All craft cost money now (because maintenance).
• Fixed the string with Stormtrooper Armour Repair.
• Scout Drone's Reactions brought up to 90, because it's so small and cute and inconspicuous, as well as made the smoke effect bigger.
• Enhanced Miniguns and Multi-Launcher.
• New icons for the Skymarshall.

I especially encourage you to give the miniguns a second chance.

[Hobbes]

Version 1.2 is online.

Nice! More things to steal borrow for my mod

[trinibwoy]

Soooo I'm not sure if this is the right place to gush about this but I'm doing it anyway.
Vanilla Xcom was beginning to feel very same-y till i came across this mod (currently using version 1.1.5). Now Xcom has numerous new ways to kick my ass again ...simply because it has restored the "unknown" factor in enemy unknown. I have no idea what i will face next. Even with the plethora of new weapons at my disposal encouraging new playstyles, I still find myself repeatedly yelling:
"what the hell is a Chtonite?"
"What the hell is a tunlun?"
"The hell is this blue thing...and why wont these snail things DIE!!!??"
"A red Tasoth? and a freakin DINOSAUR? WITH MISSILES???"

So as you can possibly surmise, I've been having a blast with this so far.
Thanks sooo much to Scorch and Hobbes and everybody who contributed to making this huge mess of an awesome mod possible.

Cheers from the Caribbean