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

[balam]

Now that I have finally gotten the 30mm cannon, things have been going better.

Anyway, since I saw someone mention that they turned their starting base into a science base, and me noticing that, with runts and brainers, I am at nearly my (current) max of 155 people:

Do some/most of you also make a dedicated 'production' base?

I turn the start base into science base cuz it already has mainframe. My second base eventually becomes my "troops base", my third base becomes hotel/prison base and all the remaining are production bases (only one with factory though). All bases get at least one hangar with a strike craft and most of 'em get casinos.

[yuriski]

Edit: I deleted my previous comment because it was garbage.


Now for some real questions:
1. Is there some armor, transformation or training I am missing for making the Lokk'Narr not suck? I had 2 'Old Earth Metro' missions and could do neither, because those goblin gals can't deal with the sort of enemy you are facing there.

2. As far as Bounty Hunt Challenges go, I thought it'd go with Zaxx, because that seems to be a requirement for getting gnomes, which in turn is a requirement for tentacle pets. But I also could really find out what the other options offer, so any tips?

[Mathel]

Edit: I deleted my previous comment because it was garbage.


Now for some real questions:
1. Is there some armor, transformation or training I am missing for making the Lokk'Narr not suck? I had 2 'Old Earth Metro' missions and could do neither, because those goblin gals can't deal with the sort of enemy you are facing there.

There are transformations and training, but none of them are a quick fix.
With armor, there are some nice armors for them. I assume you want them in small person mission, so I'll ommit tanks.

I usually use Avenger armor for Lokk'Nars, but that has to be looted from Demon God temples. Otherwise, there is Synthmetal /Lok, Spacesuit/Lok, and Slayer/Lok.
Slayer is the easiest to get, and in terms of suvivability just about brings a Lok'Nar on par with an unarmored Gal.

[yuriski]

There are transformations and training, but none of them are a quick fix.
With armor, there are some nice armors for them. I assume you want them in small person mission, so I'll ommit tanks.

I usually use Avenger armor for Lokk'Nars, but that has to be looted from Demon God temples. Otherwise, there is Synthmetal /Lok, Spacesuit/Lok, and Slayer/Lok.
Slayer is the easiest to get, and in terms of suvivability just about brings a Lok'Nar on par with an unarmored Gal.

I mean, it doesn't have to be a quick fix. I just tried one of those "Old Earth Metro" missions again with my trained Lokk'Narr and the Tentacle Hives not only either make them go insane or mind control them at the end of the first turn, they also have shields that seem immune to most I can throw at them.

[SufferNot]

I mean, it doesn't have to be a quick fix. I just tried one of those "Old Earth Metro" missions again with my trained Lokk'Narr and the Tentacle Hives not only either make them go insane or mind control them at the end of the first turn, they also have shields that seem immune to most I can throw at them.

I didn't know hives showed up in those missions. Anyway, their shields have a specific weakness to daze, and their attacks only deal charm damage. If you have a unit with high charm resistance that can deal a lot of daze damage, they're pretty trivial to take down. Gnomes have a bunch of armor options with great charm resistance, so a single gnome with a baseball bat or even bare fists and some melee skills can handle a hive. Having a canteen of stun refreshment can let them take multiple as long as you aren't eating all the counter attacks at the same time. Not sure how I'd handle that without a gnome. Probably keeping the lokks near cover and hitting the hives with tranq darts?

[Ruberto]

I'm starting new run, what difficulty should I pick for a challenging, but not overwhelming experience?
played several runs (without finishing) previously, so kinda know general gist of the mod.
Afraid of some hiddent gotchas though, like endless base attacks by military that get your ratings down no matter what and bs like that.

[yuriski]

I didn't know hives showed up in those missions. Anyway, their shields have a specific weakness to daze, and their attacks only deal charm damage. If you have a unit with high charm resistance that can deal a lot of daze damage, they're pretty trivial to take down. Gnomes have a bunch of armor options with great charm resistance, so a single gnome with a baseball bat or even bare fists and some melee skills can handle a hive. Having a canteen of stun refreshment can let them take multiple as long as you aren't eating all the counter attacks at the same time. Not sure how I'd handle that without a gnome. Probably keeping the lokks near cover and hitting the hives with tranq darts?

Oh? I have a wild gnome, but I can't take her on those missions.
Also, it's not the stun damage. Just, at the end of my turn (or the beginning of theirs), all my Lokk are hit with moral damage that makes them immediatly go insane, beserk or just has them switch sides.

[Mathel]

Mind Control is harder to defend against.

The only real defense against that is (in order of importance) VooDoo Power, Bravery and Voodoo Skill. Current Morale is technically more important than Voodoo skill, but is much more volatile. The best training is Simpleton, which increases VooDoo Power by 8 but reduces VooDoo Skill by 7. Due to difference in importance, this is a net 5.1 gain in Psi resistance.

There is also a number of condemnations that give VooDoo Power. The most powerful for this is Angel of Death, but this requires the deckhand to get lots of kills.

[Delian]

The best training is Simpleton

Which logically doesn't make any sense because simple minds were supposed to be easier to mind control.

[abyssDragoon]

I have two suggestions:

1) Lawyer condemntation. It's very punishing for those who have low hp (e.g. catgirls) and can be achieved unintentionally, as ghouls are also bandits for some reason and even damn dogs and blood hounds! Dogs?! Dogs are bandits?! Sometimes you shoot the enemy and he just collapses still alive and it's treated as +1 knock down, even if you finish enemy off afterwards. Moreover, sometimes the same bandit can score +2 knockdowns if he stands up on the next turn and then you knock him out again! As the result all my gals are Lawyers, even if they finish enemies off. -HP and -STR per rank of this condemnation is a lot when it accumulates. Catgirls are already weak and fragile, so for them it's very crippling. Please nerf the penalty of this weird condemnation or remove it altogether. Or change the way game checks for "captured" enemies, because you can easily get Idol and Lawyer in the end of the mission even if ALL enemies were killed, but some of them were knocked out before dying.

2) Allow finishing off knocked out enemies with melee weapons the same way you can heal them with bandages/medikits. If there's no one in front of you, then let the game check if there's someone below and perform an attack vs them. Or add 0-range "ranged" attack to melee weapons called "finishing blow" which can only target the same tile as the user and thus only attack below. It's especially vital for Monster Hunter condemnation, which is great to offset -HP from the Lawyer. As you need to kill the beast with melee weapon and blood hounds are apparently bandits (lol), it sometimes have the reverse effect and adds to the Lawyer instead of Monster Hunter, if blood hound survives and collapses. As the result you need to carry ranged weapon to finish off blood hound or wait for it to bleed out just to avoid really bad punishing condemnation.

[yuriski]

I am not sure if I have asked this before, but: Is there some sort of 'hard' or 'soft' timelimit? Like the game says "if you don't have xyz tech researched at this point, you pretty much have already lost"? I am not in any danger to lose because of points or getting invaded, but I also feel like I am not really progressing much in terms of techs (especially with all the interogations; probably shift those over to a different base).


Second thing: I chose to challenge Zaxx. But, now, what am I supposed to do? Just wait until a quest pops up?

[balam]

I am not sure if I have asked this before, but: Is there some sort of 'hard' or 'soft' timelimit? Like the game says "if you don't have xyz tech researched at this point, you pretty much have already lost"? I am not in any danger to lose because of points or getting invaded, but I also feel like I am not really progressing much in terms of techs (especially with all the interogations; probably shift those over to a different base).


Second thing: I chose to challenge Zaxx. But, now, what am I supposed to do? Just wait until a quest pops up?

Nah, JS got it's missiles but you can survive bombardments. As long as you can keep the score and your bases you should be fine. However, if you fall too hard behind the curve you will not have a fun time. Like all other missions, it will get added to the pool in the next month after you finish research.

[Mathel]

2) Allow finishing off knocked out enemies with melee weapons the same way you can heal them with bandages/medikits. If there's no one in front of you, then let the game check if there's someone below and perform an attack vs them. Or add 0-range "ranged" attack to melee weapons called "finishing blow" which can only target the same tile as the user and thus only attack below. It's especially vital for Monster Hunter condemnation, which is great to offset -HP from the Lawyer. As you need to kill the beast with melee weapon and blood hounds are apparently bandits (lol), it sometimes have the reverse effect and adds to the Lawyer instead of Monster Hunter, if blood hound survives and collapses. As the result you need to carry ranged weapon to finish off blood hound or wait for it to bleed out just to avoid really bad punishing condemnation.

This would sadly interfere with a different OXCE mechanic. If you are standing in front of a barrier, you can attack it in melee. If you could also melee units lying under your feet, it could get unclear whether you want to attack a wall in front of you, or a Blood Hound under your feet.
There used to be a Coup-de-Grace mechanic, but it was removed because it allowed any melee weapon to finish off any fallen unit. (even such as a charm dealing weapon to a robot)

But mostly, I'd suggest just doing a fix to condemnation triggers.
What I mean is, for knockdown and kill condemnations, only final state of the unit should count, and only the final tool that affected them.

By doing that, if you slash a Blood Hound with a sword, it falls over and dies a few turns later, it should count as kill with sword, but not a knockdown with sword.
If you slash a Blood Hound, then heal it's critical wounds with a Bandage, it should count as knockdown with bandage.

This would also prevent players from farming an absurd amount of knockdowns on a single enemy by repeatedly knocking them down with a guaranteed non-lethal weapon (such as a cattle prod), then reviving them.

[Delian]

But mostly, I'd suggest just doing a fix to condemnation triggers.

I disagree. Condemnation triggers work just fine and I like the current way they work (I also like getting Lawyer condemnation for the Voodoo gals). It makes no sense to change the whole game just because there's one condemnation you personally don't like getting.
There are plenty of other condemnations that are good to avoid and how do you avoid them? By not doing the thing that triggers them with the soldiers you don't want getting them. For instance, about half of all BURN type weapons/ammo do 0 stun damage, which guarantees killing enemies without knocking them out (Ghouls burn well btw). Alternatively, overkill them with weapons that have guaranteed high minimum damage. Another option is panic and mind control, since those neutralize enemies but don't count as making an enemy unconscious.

This would also prevent players from farming an absurd amount of knockdowns on a single enemy by repeatedly knocking them down with a guaranteed non-lethal weapon (such as a cattle prod), then reviving them.

Cattle Prod isn't a guaranteed non-lethal weapon lol. But you know, knocking out an enemy only counts the first time. If the same unit tries reviving and knocking out the same enemy again, it won't count.

[ontherun]

There used to be a Coup-de-Grace mechanic, but it was removed because it allowed any melee weapon to finish off any fallen unit. (even such as a charm dealing weapon to a robot)

Well, would be possible to have it again but only with cold weapons and not blunt ones? Maybe puttin such weapon in one hand and an enemy into the other in inventory screen, and then in battlescape clickin on the weapon pops up the option?

But mostly, I'd suggest just doing a fix to condembnation triggers.
What I mean is, for knockdown and kill condemnations, only final state of the unit should count, and only the final tool that affected them.

By doing that, if you slash a Blood Hound with a sword, it falls over and dies a few turns later, it should count as kill with sword, but not a knockdown with sword.
If you slash a Blood Hound, then heal it's critical wounds with a Bandage, it should count as knockdown with bandage.

This would also prevent players from farming an absurd amount of knockdowns on a single enemy by repeatedly knocking them down with a guaranteed non-lethal weapon (such as a cattle prod), then reviving them.

Agree on that