Re: [MAIN] XPiratez - N9.7.7 12-Sep-2024 Second Coming

[Dioxine]

By that point, handholding of any sort would be a grave insult to the player.

[Mrekalis]

Just updated after another hiatus, wanted to say the new Geoscape looks great, especially the touched-up menu buttons and stuff. Normally I think stuff like shadowing and fancier interface buttons are annoying and pointless but here that little bit of extra detail actually really adds something. In general the game feels a bit more vibrant now.

This is kind of off-topic but I really wanted to share this anecdote: About three-ish years back, Fallout 4 had just come out and I was talking to a friend who'd purchased it. I got on the topic of how the "laser-muskets" in the game were a goofy idea and mentioned that it would have been more interesting if the game started you off with actual muskets to show just how badly things had degraded and how primitive the survivors had become. We concluded Fallout 4 just wasn't that kind of game, I think. Literal days later I downloaded X-Piratez from some backwater site with zero idea of what to expect, went on my first mission and found... you start off with actual muskets. Mind blown.

I still can't believe the sheer density of content in the mod and finding something I have an interest in made it into the mod is always a sweet surprise (ex. the raygun from Forbidden Planet, werewolves, Flash Gordon references). You've gotta be in the running for maximum number of references and content rolled into one game by this point. But the one that's always gonna stick with me is seeing that random idea I had just materialize by some insane coincidence. I was grinning like an idiot. Well, at least until my troops were slaughtered to almost nothing on the first mission, but that comes with the territory.

[Rince Wind]

Congratz to another RockPaperShotgun article!

[LytaRyta]

guys, you are becomeing famous!
(..and rich :p )

[Bloax]

(..and rich)

[Dioxine]

guys, you are becomeing famous!
(..and rich :p )

More like poor, donations cover maybe 10% of developement costs, lol.

[suicicoo]

i want to say thanks(again?) for this awesome mod, dioxine!
i have a question though:
did you try making bows with pocket-hold or offhand-hold ammo?
paying reload-times for a bow doesn't make sense to me.

[JustTheDude/CABSHEP]

TU cost for reloading bows is very small... I don't see reason to eliminate this entirely.
It makes sense that Gal "opens" quiver to take another arrow and it's fast.

[Sahti Waari]

Hello, everyone!

Could anyone please describe me home camo works?
I think, 26/8 means the enemy spot me from 26 tiles at day and 8 at night.
Does it mean 8/2 make soldier almost invisible?

[cc]

Could anyone please describe me home camo works?

A camo rating of 8/2 reduces the tiles you can be spotted from by 8 when illuminated and 2 when not (assuming the enemy has no spot).

[LytaRyta]

I Suggest that Impaler would has (have) got also auto~shot too, let say 3x (well, with very, VERY slightly decreased accurancy...


and for engineers and workers~constructeurs, ~ lets give them some handy workshop' combineses, "engineers outfits - all with alot of pockets and sockets, for pocket tools, pencils et pens, knifves, screwdrivers, handheld tools & techie stuffs & gadgets, etc.. 8:)

[Ashghan]

Hello, everyone!

Could anyone please describe me home camo works?
I think, 26/8 means the enemy spot me from 26 tiles at day and 8 at night.
Does it mean 8/2 make soldier almost invisible?

Basic sight range (for most units - there are exceptions) is 40 tiles in daylight. At night it's 9 for baseline humans with no NV equipment, 12 for gals, more for NV or mutants (sectoids/hybrids see really good in darkness). Zombies are blind (they have Sense, which detects living beings even through walls) so camo is useless against them.

Some enemies (as well as armors) have a Spot:X statistic, which reduces your camo and/or invisibility by X (up to 0 - camo can't be negative) for both day and night.

Invisibility is somewhat inverse of camo - 8/2 is the maximum range you can be seen by day/night. Invisibility:5 means you can't be spotted when you are 6+ tiles away from an enemy (barring Spot:).

[Rince Wind]

and for engineers and workers~constructeurs, ~ lets give them some handy workshop' combineses, "engineers outfits - all with alot of pockets and sockets, for pocket tools, pencils et pens, knifves, screwdrivers, handheld tools & techie stuffs & gadgets, etc.. 8:)

It is called Runt Outfit.

[Ashghan]

i want to say thanks(again?) for this awesome mod, Dioxine!
i have a question though:
did you try making bows with pocket-hold or offhand-hold ammo?
paying reload-times for a bow doesn't make sense to me.

It makes complete sense to me.
A) In reality quivers do not hold a lot of arrows - sport shooting quivers (placed at the hip/belt) hold 10-12 arrows (these are thin, light and not very long). "Historical" quivers held from 10-20 (belt quivers) to 20-40 (back quivers) - depending on the size of the bow (and thus arrows). Piratez-wise we can assume the quivers used are the smaller kind worn on the belt (so they do not take any actual equipment space).
B) Most of the time quivers were not worn in a way that was readily accessible - they usually had covers, strings, etc. that would keep the arrows protected in transport and/or from falling out during movement. Thus, the 'reload' of the bow is (I always assumed) the time-cost of preparing another quiver to fire, not the cost of 'reloading' the bow with a new arrow (which is factored in TU of a shot).

Also a question regarding "pocket-hold" - how do you expect holding a bundle of, say,12x 50cm arrows in a pocket without them interfering with movement and/or getting damaged? I once forgot my quiver to practice and had to shoot arrows held in a cargo-pants side pocket - doable, but forget about moving and bloody difficult to draw new arrows.
"offhand hold" (ie. you hold the arrows with the same hand that you hold the bow with) is good for 3-4 shots at most - impossible to hold more and still maintain a comfortable grip. And even then your accuracy suffers, because you don't have a sure grip.

[Dakkdakk]

Its mostly a case of interpretation and gameplay vs reality segregation, though I do also think the current way bows are handled makes sense.

An alternative would be to have bows only handle a single arrow at a time, while at the same time making reloading really cheap in TUs, but that would be an annoying change to make for something that would add very little to gameplay, IMHO.

I do admit I don't use bows because of the energy cost per shot vs the possible damage dealt. It seems like they'd be good weapons for Lok'nars, since they almost invariably get good throwing and energy starting stats, but even then the damage is kinda meh. They aren't even good for training throwing, since you can just use whips and/or sunblades for that instead. Right now only the most hi-end bows are worth using, IMO.