Obsolete technology

[bladum]

Simple idea. If tech is required to buy / made stuff then it also some tech could made stuff obsolete.

This means that research "Enhanced ammo for ballistics" will disable standard ammo and enable enhanced one.

Why this is needed ? For some weapons there are only 3 slots for ammo. In case of HC / AC adding 4th ammo is impossible to do in vanilla. Standard AP ammo would be replaced by Enhanced alien alloys based AP ammo.

Tom

[bladum]

This could be also used for alternative tech tree.

So player can pick to research tech A or tech B. Tech A makes obsolete Tech B and vice versa.

Tom

[yrizoud]

It's complicated if you also want to upgrade the existing instances, depending on type :
Piece of equipment : in base stores, ships, soldier equipment (and equipment templates), alien deployments
Base facility : in base
Ship : in bases and also in mid-flight ?
HWP : in base stores and ships

In all cases, the new version had better be very compatible with the old... for example a 1x1 equipment shouldn't upgrade to a 2x2, a transport ship shouldn't have lower personal capacity, a facility should have same size...

[bladum]

Actually its quite simple to make

Everywere where required is implemented then something oposite must be added. Below is pseudo code.

Code: [Select]

item / craft / ufopedia etc is available when:
obsolete tech is not owned
required tech is owned


[Arthanor]

But.. why would you want items to become obsolete/unavailable?

In the XAE, I have alien alloy ammo (for pretty much every starting weapon) and elerium explosive ammo (for anything that is explosive at the beginning). That doesn't mean I don't want to use regular bullets when shooting sectoids, or regular explosives when engaging reapers. Same thing for armor (personal armor is good enough for base defenses) and HWPs (you don't need a overtank in base defenses since you can't hover any ways, regular tanks are enough).

It seems to me like there's little benefit to this feature, and potentially quite some work to put it in. While I agree that some lists can get crowded with old tech (the manufacturing one especially, which can be solved by using categories properly and the nightly), keeping old tech has no other downside otherwise.

[yrizoud]

Items in the openxcom engine have fixed stats that depend on their type. Upgrade/Deprecate system would let you have stats (and string)s that vary over the course of the game.

STR_PROBE0 : A weird shiny item. You can try hit aliens on the head with it.
(Research : Weird shiny object. Upgrades all instances of PROBE0 into PROBE1)
STR_PROBE1 : A kind of decoder. You can view alien stats, but it costs you 100% TU to use
(Research : Advanced mind techniques. Upgrades all instances of PROBE1 into PROBE2)
STR_PROBE1 : Mind probe. using it costs 50% TU.

[bladum]

1) create a alternative tech tree = pick laser or plasma branch for example
2) choose tactical options = pick laser shotgun (close range) or long range sniper rifles
3) story could alter game options = if you research Commander he reveals the truth about X then you lose option to build / buy / research some specific stuff
4) remove obsolete items from lists, that are no more used by player
5) mix of one of above = choose between many weak weapons or few strong ones by special technologies similar to Hearts of Iron series called strategies. So x-com could be strong at: interception OR amours OR hand weapons etc... if you pick one path then others are not available.
6) player choices actually change aliens behavior, so in future maybe even missions or crafts would require or obsolete technologies, this could control story somehow other then just alien score and / or one mission per month system
7) create stronger version of same weapon with same name and image but different stats

So there are many practical use of such feature.

[HelmetHair]

Torn on this idea...

One hand I typically play in phases of equipment with one generation replacing another just as soon as I can and my primary Assault team getting priority on weapons, armor, and equipment in large outlay purchases and would love to see this happen more gradually with weapons and equipment just suddenly becoming better and not having to fiddle with it.

on the other hand sometimes I need a simple pistol or rifle with regular bullets to act as a stun weapon... Or a regular grenade. Bigger is not necessarily better either with explosives... especially on terror missions.

As far as a stair step of upgrading weapons, that exists already with differently defined ammo having different values tied to them. I would point at Equal Terms 1.9X on this with the alloy manufacturing research. So you can begin making superior ammunition and explosives in your workshops that rock and increase effectiveness by 10-15%.

-HH

[Falko]

the only use i would see for me would be this

Code: [Select]

  - name: STR_NEW_FIGHTER_CRAFT_FASTER1
    cost: 500 #-100 cost
    obsoletes:
      - STR_NEW_FIGHTER_CRAFT
    dependencies:
      - STR_UFO_CONSTRUCTION
      - STR_PLASMA_CANNON

  - name: STR_NEW_FIGHTER_CRAFT_FASTER2
    cost: 350 #-250 cost
    obsoletes:
      - STR_NEW_FIGHTER_CRAFT
      - STR_NEW_FIGHTER_CRAFT_FASTER1
    dependencies:
      - STR_UFO_CONSTRUCTION
      - STR_PLASMA_CANNON
      - STR_FUSION_MISSILE
      - STR_POWER_SUIT
so it would allow to make things like if you researched X .. researching Y is faster ,...
problem here is what happens with the researchproject that is runnning but becomes obsolete
and for obsolete item manufcture/ufopedia/... i can imagine many such annoying problems
therefore i dont see that anyone implements it in a useful way

[Arthanor]

Items in the openxcom engine have fixed stats that depend on their type. Upgrade/Deprecate system would let you have stats (and string)s that vary over the course of the game.

That does sound cool. Items upgrade that aren't really because you upgrade the item, but because your soldiers are better at using them. Copy-paste most stuff related to the item (manufacturing, ufopaedia, etc.) and it could be done. Neat. I hadn't thought of that possibility.

Faster research by replacing projects is also interesting, but I think you'd need "front" projects, all of which unlock the same actual research, like "STR_NEW_FIGHTER_CRAFT_F0" "...1", "...F2", "...F3" all unlock "STR_NEW_FIGHTER_CRAFT", so that your manufacturing project can require the one project and unlock for any of the researchs. Makes trees even more messy, if more versatile.

As a player, I don't like games that are like: You can have X or Y. Picked X? Well now you can't have Y. It always feels contrived when it's related to tech/research. If I want a sniper rifle and a shotgun, why can't I ask my researchers to work on both? They forget their shotgun idea because they worked on a sniper rifle? Those things should be balanced by research cost: You want both, you need to spend the time getting both.

Anyhow, cool option and as HH said, to be used carefully

PS. I forgot to reply to this, but it is entirely possible to do UFOPaedia pageS for the AutoCannon, which allows you to cover multiple ammos. You'd have a page for the AutoCannon with the 3 base ammo, followed by another page for up to 3 more ammos. You can make as many pages as you need this way.

[Hobbes]

Simple idea. If tech is required to buy / made stuff then it also some tech could made stuff obsolete.

This means that research "Enhanced ammo for ballistics" will disable standard ammo and enable enhanced one.

Why this is needed ? For some weapons there are only 3 slots for ammo. In case of HC / AC adding 4th ammo is impossible to do in vanilla. Standard AP ammo would be replaced by Enhanced alien alloys based AP ammo.

Tom

You're saying you can't add a 4th ammo type on the ruleset? Are you sure you're doing it the right way?

[Arthanor]

In the UFOPaedia you can't. The page has 3 slots for ammo because vanilla had at most 3 ammo. You certainly can in the ruleset though and being a bit crafty allows you to work around the UFOPaedia limitations.

[jackstraw2323]

It's an interesting idea. I could see there being some sort of hyper unique item that there's only one of and you could research tree a or tree b. As a game mechanic it would increase replayability, provided it's spelled out up front what the implications are.

[Hobbes]

In the UFOPaedia you can't. The page has 3 slots for ammo because vanilla had at most 3 ammo. You certainly can in the ruleset though and being a bit crafty allows you to work around the UFOPaedia limitations.

What about making a separate UFOPaedia page for the new ammo? Sounds a easier than trying to edit the original pages, plus it makes the new stuff stand out more than having simply new ammo clips for the cannons.

[Arthanor]

Yes, a new page is possible and so is an AutoCannon page clone with the different ammos if you do a bit more work. That's what I meant with the last part of the post.