Re: [MAIN] XPiratez - N7 16-Dec-2023 Flying Tiger, Hidden Tentacle

[ivandogovich]

I personally found the Airballs worthless when I tried them in my last run.  Out of 5 engagements with Civ ships, I had 3 complete misses expending all ammo, and 2 complete destructions of the target craft.

[Starving Poet]

I had moderate success with the airballs - but honestly, at the time it was all I had available, so they worked better than flashing my headlights.  :-p

[just_dont]

I personally found the Airballs worthless when I tried them in my last run.  Out of 5 engagements with Civ ships, I had 3 complete misses expending all ammo, and 2 complete destructions of the target craft.

That's about the same as my experience with them - too strong for civilians, and way too risky to use against anything stronger. Thought it's theoretically possible to wreck a Runabout with them. Theoretically.

[karadoc]

I just got a soldier with VooDoo strength of 61.    I thought the max was 60. 60 is the highest I've seen in my previous two play-throughs, and the Bootypedia says that 60 is the max for female Ubers.

Has the maximum been changed? Perhaps its a special feature of rescued ship-wrecked gals or something? Or is this the result of some kind of rare special condition which allows the stat to go above the maximum. (I know that that stats trained in battle can go above the maximum; and I often deliberately try to make that happen - but VooDoo strength is not a trained stat...)

[Dioxine]

Your starting gals, and the ones you rescue, have a slight edge (max 62).

[karadoc]

Your starting gals, and the ones you rescue, have a slight edge (max 62).

Fair enough. Thanks.

And just to clarify, am I right in assume that there is no max-stats advance of Warriors over Hands? I'm at a point in the game where I could easily afford to recruit only warriors, but I figure I don't need to because my luxury spa provides me with a plentiful supply of fully trained hands. (I suppose the warriors would have better starting bravery and reactions, but I'm not too worried about that.)

[just_dont]

And just to clarify, am I right in assume that there is no max-stats advance of Warriors over Hands?

Yes. Warriors can have better initial stats, but stat caps are the same as Hands.

[Martin]

Hi. Thanks for excellent mod, I am having a great time.

I'd like to suggest addition of mid to late game tamed celatids to future release. Adding some animal that spits poison or flies would be good for the hunt missions, presently I can send single freshly hired gal in grav harness armed with the arena fireball launcher and win everytime.

I woudl also like to see new heavily armed baddies start to spawn after certain number of turns on the mansion mission, so that you actually have to rush in, steal all you can pick and get out before cavalry arrives. In its present incarnation the mission is just too profitable for the loot you get, but that might be difficult or impossible to implement.

[Solarius Scorch]

I'd like to suggest addition of mid to late game tamed celatids to future release. Adding some animal that spits poison or flies would be good for the hunt missions, presently I can send single freshly hired gal in grav harness armed with the arena fireball launcher and win everytime.

Well, you can take a parrot and give it an acid grenade to drop.

But yes, more creatures are always nice.

I woudl also like to see new heavily armed baddies start to spawn after certain number of turns on the mansion mission, so that you actually have to rush in, steal all you can pick and get out before cavalry arrives. In its present incarnation the mission is just too profitable for the loot you get, but that might be difficult or impossible to implement.

We're just discussing similar ideas on the Discord channel right now, everyone's invited: https://discord.gg/GUyBtFh

[ivandogovich]

Some reflections on my current game in the latest incarnation: .99e.2.

I've played about a year and a half into the game and am loving the new missions, content, and rewards.  The new monsters (scorps were the only game in town when I last played) help alot to give a good platform for progression and keep early game missions interesting. 

The much greater supply of apples helps alot with early finances, and once they become less profitable than other merch (forgery), the steady supply does a lot to make up for the fact that Rum is now a one-use item. 

I love that I got some gems for my First Pyramid of Pain, as it gives a nice incentive to grind these out.  Likewise, I like the new loot hauls on Military Supply missions.  Getting Defender armor from these has always been a huge boost, but now also getting weapon parts like heavy couplings is terrific.  The Ret Outpost with the Moon Flower rewards are another great example.

The better use of personal databases, and the ability to harvest disks from them is a huge improvement.

Also: The Junkmaster is now useful.  Thanks for removing the health penalty. 

My standard approach has been to rush to Air Car for civ traffic interceptions.  I've then moved up to a main loadout of Pachyderm and Jetbike.  The bike shoots down civ vessels only, and the pilot solos these in Defender armor and a domestic shotgun with rubber slugs for accuracy training.  All other shipping gets tailed by the Pachyderm or maybe the Jetbike.  I did build out an underwater "B" team with a Turtle in another base, and have had two undersea adventures.  I was able to bring Mag ammo with Homefront rifles to my first encounter with Sharks, and they were more than up to the task.  DeepOne nomads fared no better, and I've sent them to some bloodhound hunts for some training too. 

I generally pursued a policy of exhausting interrogation on prisoners that could tell me about weapons etc, and ground through all the low level minions in all the major factions.  I generally pursued weapon and armor upgrades over craft, but also with an eye to unlocking key facilities.  I'm 42% through the tech tree with 17 brainers in my main base, and 10 in my Lab base (with expansion for 10 more in the works).  I have one mint production base with 270 workers keeping us in business, with 2 other forgery production centers in development.

I waited a LONG time to build my Menace Class because of the restrictions to the Voodoo Schools it presents.  My two favorite schools are Illusion (For Ghost and Witch) and Communion (for Saviour and Slave outfits).  However, I can't get these schools together.  I feel Illusion is strongest of all,  but it only pairs with Destruction and Excess.  The Destructor suit sounds awesome but I've never used it, and I kinda really don't like Darkones, nor Demonic Rituals etc, for both a flavor stance and a playability.  So my only other option is the Illusion/Excess pair.  Excess seems kinda weak, but I'm interested in seeing out the Fairy Outfit works.  So I have a Fuego built, but not crewed.  Overall, I think this is hardest part of the game, and I'd give my eye teeth to be able to get a codex of Communion.

Anyway, thanks for the great work on the mod.  Still loving it!

[karadoc]

I was able to bring Mag ammo with Homefront rifles to my first encounter with Sharks, and they were more than up to the task.  DeepOne nomads fared no better, and I've sent them to some bloodhound hunts for some training too.

Hmm. I didn't know that guns like that worked underwater. I've been using harpoons, crossbows, and javelins, because those are the only things that I usually bring in my transport that work underwater - and I assumed that most guns wouldn't work.

--


While I'm here, here's an unrelated comment about how my current game is going:  In my previous games, I never used Reverent armour; because by the time I unlocked it I already has carapace armour and various other useful armours; and so it was kind of obsolete before I got it (and it takes a lot of workshop time to construct). However! In my current game, I've had a few research bottlenecks due to missing resources, and so reverent armour became the main armour that I use for my team. In fact, I'm now at a stage where a lot my crew is wearing brute armour and I still haven't unlocked defender armour (because I haven't captured a zealot).

I think it's cool that different tech paths and equipment are relevant on different playthoughs. Maybe in some future playthough I'll actually use Xeno armour!

...

That said, I've been using the tech tree viewer a fair bit to see what I'm missing and what I need - which I think is a good thing, because otherwise I'd be completely baffled as to why I can't research some particular things. But I do think it would be nicer if it had a bit of 'spoiler' protection. I'm still in favour of the system I suggested earlier.

[edit]
By the way, just while I think of it...  The Bootypedia entry for the electro-whip should probably mention that it stuns enemies rather than kills them (unless it actually does kill them in the latest version).

[legionof1]

The fairy is an exceptional capture unit... on paper. In practice the lack of hands coupled with the high morale/energy/stun costs necessitates low rate of fire without a assistant with support items. Also needs additional supporting units for when the powers prove insufficient to incapacitate its targets, since its a little on the flimsy side for the short range and its expense. The individual attacks are quite powerful but its difficult to get off more then 2 shots in a turn of either power. Also lucky star is a grenade-like attack so arcs are a thing.


In terms of the outfits from the schools i would rate it something like:
1: Ghost: functionally invulnerable scout that can kill anything in the game while being fairly cheap to produce.
2: Witch: mind control nuff said.
3: Biosuit: 95% indestructible and multi environment, pretty expensive to build.
4: Destructor: Flight, minor regen, durability second only to high end power armor and the biosuit, and massive damage potential without blocking both hands. Downside is production issues resulting from the difficulty of getting 50 demonic essence. Dark ones are nearly immune to stun while being low on hp and armor, and the 7 slaves to 1 essence ratio is prohibitive. I count myself lucky if I manage more then 1 or 2 a game.
5: Fairy: More frail, non lethal only, and less flexible destructor. 
6: Savior: High speed super nurse with a Psi based melee stun attack. Unfortunately none of its abilities are exceptionally more powerful then other options to warrant dedicating a gal to it(and a high psi one if you want the melee to be worth a damn).

[Martin]

I waited a LONG time to build my Menace Class because of the restrictions to the Voodoo Schools it presents.  My two favorite schools are Illusion (For Ghost and Witch) and Communion (for Saviour and Slave outfits).  However, I can't get these schools together.  I feel Illusion is strongest of all,  but it only pairs with Destruction and Excess.  The Destructor suit sounds awesome but I've never used it, and I kinda really don't like Darkones, nor Demonic Rituals etc, for both a flavor stance and a playability.  So my only other option is the Illusion/Excess pair.  Excess seems kinda weak, but I'm interested in seeing out the Fairy Outfit works.  So I have a Fuego built, but not crewed.  Overall, I think this is hardest part of the game, and I'd give my eye teeth to be able to get a codex of Communion.

Paralyzed by choices, eh?

Anyway, I think it's not much of an choice in the end, as illusion is wastly superior to communion and fortuna is somwhat better than fuego as it can go to space.

[legionof1]

Early space access is kinda a big deal. It what sold me on going for grey over anything else. The orbital prisons in particular are quite good as they yield better gals then other options. The "lunatic" class of gals have a 40-62 pis strength, higher max energy at 150, and higher minimum bravery. Some stats have pretty bad minimums but nothing training and experience can't solve. The psi strength is just to good to miss out on.     

[Dioxine]

New version released. Merry Christmas.