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

[legionof1]

Snip
And a soft reminder to remove academy drones from mansions... those bastards can't panic on this maze-like map.

And difficult to deal with mansions curtailed weapon options, but at least they can't fly up out of throwing range.

[Ethereal_Medic]

It's more the mapwide panic that spreads through the acedemy goons as they lose man after man but those drones (besides been weak in damage and acc.) just refuse to give up. With a 32 turnlimit map I'm realy pushed to overextend past 2x snapshot range to get those drones down and proceed to hunt more humans with combat armor.

Smartpistol due the job nicely and super magnums can even clear walls in one shot (most of the time) yet I don't like those mansion towers with no natural entrance to them. The A.I. is trapped inside these towers unless the player helps out. With an 'jailed' esper inside this tower you better not have vision on your team for too long or things go voodoo

Academy Engi's with shotguns ain't pretty to deal with xD

[Scorrpio]

I got my first mansion(church) shortly after unlocking plasma.   Went in with plasma pistols.  It was a bloodbath.   Over in 10 turns.   Did not even bother with doors.  Plasma goes through walls like they are not there.

[KPJZKC]

Hi all,

My last playthrough was on v98.B, and jumping in now with the current version there are a couple of things throwing me off. I'm almost suspecting I've messed up the installation somehow, but I've deleted and retried several times).

First, the menus are back to the old XCOM UFO strings - eg, there's no piratespeak in the menu. On the geoscape the Bootypedia is labelled UFOpedia again, rather than in 0.98.
Similarly, the piratespeak from the base menu is gone, so HANDS = SOLDIERS, etc.
I can understand if this was changed at some point for intuitiveness.

And the second point that makes me suspect I messed something up is that I've done 5 - 6 small landed UFO raids but haven't recovered anything sellable (e.g. engines) which is making it quite hard to earn any real money. Has recovering & selling parts been locked behind a tech?

Thanks a lot!

[Ethereal_Medic]

I got my first mansion(church) shortly after unlocking plasma.   Went in with plasma pistols.  It was a bloodbath.   Over in 10 turns.   Did not even bother with doors.  Plasma goes through walls like they are not there.

Plasma Pistols against church? One way it's tough luck considering the faction encountered and a lucky star for you to manage to penetrate church-matrons and priests anti-plasma suits. At least church has a higher change of masspanic and end the mission through surrender.

Considering Plasma realy deep inside the techtree I guess you got realy "realy" lucky in capturing academy provosts to get one for research and another one for interogation.

Could you link your current save-state to the attachments plz? I want to check your strategy
You can have mine in exchange.

[Marza]

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What language is enabled in the game options? I think it needs to be US American English.

Small UFO raids at the start of the game won't yield engines, hellerium or plastasteel, possible to compensate for that these small UFOs are guaranteed to land near your starting position. There will be some loot though, in the form of dropped weapons and equipment, plus any hostages you take.

[Lorskel]

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I know this may sound silly, but have you actually activated the Piratez mod in the mods section?
I know that on first bootup I had to do that, otherwise the game looked like ordinary XCom.

[ivandogovich]

@KPJKC  Both previous suggestions are right on the money.

If you are still having problems, there is a Video Tutorial on installing X-Piratez here: https://youtu.be/L1WUpX9n7gY?t=54m11s

[Scorrpio]

Plasma Pistols against church? One way it's tough luck considering the faction encountered and a lucky star for you to manage to penetrate church-matrons and priests anti-plasma suits. At least church has a higher change of masspanic and end the mission through surrender.

Considering Plasma realy deep inside the techtree I guess you got realy "realy" lucky in capturing academy provosts to get one for research and another one for interogation.

Could you link your current save-state to the attachments plz? I want to check your strategy
You can have mine in exchange.

Church are definitely resistant to lasers but plasma seems to power through whatever they have.
Adding a save from June 2602.

I did get lucky on Provosts.  Academy built a base in Dec '01 right after I unlocked small launchers.   I bagged a provost and two espers with one stun bomb.    Then Academy decided to build another base right next to my main base and I managed to capture almost every craft involved, including 3 frigates and a cruiser - which had another provost.  And of courrse then I raided the base which had an unusually low crew: one provost, one cyberdisk, and a bunch of Osiron/Explorers/Drones.  By contrast, first base had provost, two espers, four cyberdisks and a boatload of others.

I hoped to find a Cardinal in that church mansion, but it was just one reverend...

[Ethereal_Medic]

Church are definitely resistant to lasers but plasma seems to power through whatever they have.
Adding a save from June 2602.

I guess Blackbeard difficulty offers alot more time to establish a financial boost.
Snatching all those base-builder ships must have net enough cash to fast-expand to 8 hideouts.
Your research is extremyl focused on weaponry and buildings, I found no better armor than tac-vests and your statistic scores a whooping 300million cash earned not even half year 2602. With 67 hands recruited and only 3 swabbies been killed you sure know how to deal with your opponents. Well played.

[KPJZKC]

I know this may sound silly, but have you actually activated the Piratez mod in the mods section?
I know that on first bootup I had to do that, otherwise the game looked like ordinary XCom.

I know this may sound silly, but have you actually activated the Piratez mod in the mods section?
I know that on first bootup I had to do that, otherwise the game looked like ordinary XCom.

@KPJKC  Both previous suggestions are right on the money.

If you are still having problems, there is a Video Tutorial on installing X-Piratez here: https://youtu.be/L1WUpX9n7gY?t=54m11s

Thanks for the help, I had selected the mod in the menu a few times but it didn't activate properly due to the language setting.

All done now.

[legionof1]

Church are definitely resistant to lasers but plasma seems to power through whatever they have.
snip

Plasma often just has raw punch to not care about anything but the targets hp pool. Few targets have the high armor/resist combination necessary to withstand even the weakest plasma weapons. Even then plasma guaranteed armor stripping ensures eventual success. A provost despite reasonable resist only has 70 ish front armor.

Lasers by contrast despite inbuilt 33% armor pen often lack the base damage to overcome remaining armor on 60+ armor targets. 

[greattuna]

So I look at this save with 8 bases on month 18, and then I look at my save with one-and-a-quarter base on month 15, where my best weapons are hunting rifle and hammer, and I realize that my strategical planning is very poor, and that going in blind was probably a bad idea. Though it isn't reset-worthy yet, I feel like I'll get wiped once real crackdowns start.

[Scorrpio]

Mind, this is played as far from blind as you can get.   There is no cheating involved - that is no savegame editing to give me stuff etc.  And I do tend to restart missions that go bad.   But I have put together a research analyzer that fully plumbs the tree and shows precisely what goes where.  Likewise, I ran a detailed analysis of manufactures to find the most efficient ones every step of the way.  And I did get lucky with high-ranking academy captures.

[ivandogovich]

<snip>   But I have put together a research analyzer that fully plumbs the tree and shows precisely what goes where. 
Likewise, I ran a detailed analysis of manufactures to find the most efficient ones every step of the way.  <snip>

Okay. Time to Share your toys.  Probably start a new thread and pass on some of your goodies?