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

[ivandogovich]

The current stance is

Altar Boys > Squires  (Extremely under-performing slave)
Squire > Yeoman ( Much better slave in cash generated and space saved.  Also generates Demonic Essence which is amazing)
Yeoman (and others) > Farmhouse  ( The best "slave" in the game! Great Cash, awesome space, sell all but one vault sort of amazingness).

So allowing "Yeomen" to be recruited in as Slave Soldiers + would potentially be a player trap that has them missing farmhouses altogether.   Therefore I think the idea of making them into soldiers is probably counter-productive.

[greattuna]

Civilization is advanced in the regard that it requires A LOT of things to research beforehand, and allowing to flat-out bypass the prerequisites is not something Dioxine would like, I think.
Besides, disks are there to make you able to fill the gaps should you miss something important, not to research advanced topic without actual researching... hm, maybe it'd be a good idea to put this implosion bomb launcher as a "get one for free" topic. nevermind me, it was mentioned as a stopgap.

[legionof1]

Mostly its an side effect of an incomplete mod. Original maps and missions to serve as delivery mechanisms for certain items are the most time intensive part of the modding process.

[RSSwizard]

Mostly its an side effect of an incomplete mod. Original maps and missions to serve as delivery mechanisms for certain items are the most time intensive part of the modding process.

What it means is map scripting needs to be enhanced to allow random loot distribution lists, much like treasure drop chances in roleplaying games. Dioxine does this currently by varying the month to month equipment the enemies get, and also by presenting random maps (some of which look the same) which have different items deposited on them using the same mechanic vanilla used to drop e115 on maps.

Maybe its been proposed before, but things like this rienforce the need for it. Missions which dont always yield the same benefits even though its the same map with the same crew. Escalated on a month by month basis as well so that way the random distribution also changes much like unit equipment.

It wouldnt mean that Dioxine had to overhaul the way the loot distribution is right now. It would mean after doing all that work, now it could be added to and even more randomization could be involved, including patching little holes here and there to address issues like this (filthy implosion bomb launcher).

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Ill also mention another problem ive been having with piratez (unrelated to topic) is that the Sentry Rocket Launcher is unable to open the door to fire out the back of the transport.

I know its got 3 TU specifically so that it cant move even a single tile, but it also means that it cant open the door to fire out.

If it got turned into a Tank with a very low number of TUs (maybe 16-20) that would allow it to reposition and open the door but prevent any reasonable exploits of having that kind of weapon early on in the game.

I mean ive taken these things on EuroSyndicate Eliminations - one time it ended up on the Roof and that was nice, but the next time it ended up in the bathroom which didnt make any sense. I could have blown holes in walls to provide it with a route of egress to fire those rockets but thats not the point.

On the 2 Base Defenses ive had to deal with all of the HWPs have been shuffled into the lower right corner of the base for some reason, farthest from the access points in that base, and the Sentry Rocket Launcher was useless for helping because of the way the corridors were aligned.

Being able to move it around just a little bit would also allow players to get in trouble by exposing it to more fire, but not being able to get it back into the transport fast enough to save it.

Bottom line is it needs to be able to both Open A Door and Fire in the same turn, and maybe 2 more TU to rotate. 22 Time Units and a flat TU cost of 12 to fire would make this workable.

I mean if it cant open the transport door to fire out of, then its a serious resource trap for the players and it shouldn't even be in the game considering (it doesnt do what its supposed to do).

There IS a great idea there that would be simple to implement to create characters, interactive Turrets and other objects that are stationary or move very slow. By having a property for units that multiply its TU movement costs. Then those Robot Guards on the watchtower/warehouse maps could actually be terrorist-rank units that dont move and arent simply map objects. Likewise also very slow moving things, which would still be impervious to TU-draining attacks, but also remain functional for map movement.

Which reminds me that the Deliverator needs an access ramp of some kind off the back - I never really had this problem but if I needed to Evacuate from a mission and I had dropped a Tank out the back, there's no other way to get it back into the Deliverator.

I sold my codex ship the moment the Deliverator became available, so ive used it very heavily and only recently replaced it with the Drakkar.

[legionof1]

The sentry was made for one exact purpose, to make exits from open exit craft doable against severe opposition. Expecting to work in closed door craft that i was never meant for by design is user error. Like microwaveing tinfoil. 

[RSSwizard]

The sentry was made for one exact purpose, to make exits from open exit craft doable against severe opposition. Expecting to work in closed door craft that it was never meant for by design is user error. Like microwaveing tinfoil.

I never got that impression about the hwp at all. And I never would have used it for that either. 150 explosive damage is nowhere near enough to secure a beachhead, against things that would pin down the pirates so thoroughly. Its like bowler's hell or fending off the army at the end of butch cassidy - you gotta hit multiple directions not just one place, they're all over the place.

My understanding was the sentry rocket was for:
We get a Blaster Launcher midgame but it comes with conditions, first it cant be carried by units, second it only has 2 waypoints not more, third it only does 150 damage not 200, and fourth it doesnt move around either.

But the idea of being able to "poop" rockets out the back of my ship at enemies is awesome (and a novel idea). Almost like being able to take the ship's main weapon and use it to hose people down, I would really love doing that with the 105mm RL, it would just feel so right.

Understandably, having that hampered by these issues feels like a bug to me and gets in the way of having fun with it (as well as the weird placement of map objects... arent any of these routemaps tagged as "Large Unit" spawn points? in ES elimination maps anything 2x2 should naturally go on the roof)

Ill see if I can hack it to work like I indicated, for my own enjoyment at least.

[legionof1]

The problem the sentry was built to counter was things like staring down a terror unit or mini nuke user straight out the wide open door that a number of transports have on turn one. Those situations where such that you needed to kill that critical unit with a single shot or you lose the majority of the squad to the first reaction shot. The sentry offers significant power very early in play and sufficient defense that it can tank bad landings while the gals get out the other exits.

It didn't even have way-points at first, that's actually pretty recent. It was made to solve a very specific problem(forcing bad landings in open craft) before ~80% of the tech tree is open to the player. Back when it was introduced you started in the bonnyveturea and codex picks didn't exist nor any of the present early game. You often had to fight pretty much the full range of possible foes/equipment with nothing but a bunch of gals muskets and handles. Now with the much smoother and measured pace early game it's kinda a relic of questionable value.

[ivandogovich]

Also:  The the sentry gun is ideal for the Thunderhorse (Dropship) which has two of those big open bays.  Its armor is strong enough, is should be able to tank a lot of fire (though understandably not nukes).  I believe Dioxine's intent is that he would include it if he could into the actual design of the vessel but there are some limitations with spawning units as part of craft.  With the addition of the waypoints a few months back, it went from being a pretty useless hunk of metal on quite a few landings as it would be right against the edge of the map, to a fairly useful complement to that vessel.

[RSSwizard]

The problem the sentry was built to counter was things like staring down a terror unit or mini nuke user straight out the wide open door that a number of transports have on turn one.

There's a reason there's a bootypedia entry about "dont charge out of the transport on turn one". If you give them a turn to move there's a liklihood they'll scatter or turn in other directions to make it possible to do something about them. And it makes sense anyway, the enemy has had plenty of time to get into position as they see your craft approach (or panic and scatter into the woods, as the case often is with civilians).

The availability of a side exit door often affords another way to deal with reaction fire, which im thankful alot of ships have. Kinda contrived, but if you know where the guy is, you can have someone prime a grenade, drop it, have someone else go out the side door and throw it at the dude. Hellerium grenades can be potent, and they are available at least midgame.

And if you knew you was going to have this problem, its easy enough to reload the save prior to going into battle, and it'll reroll the entire terrain and placements. More than likely it wont come up on the reroll. This is not the kind of thing where "I know ill have someone drawing a bead on the ramp, so im going to bring this thing to make an exit".

Ive never had this problem to be honest. It really does not happen that often. So if you're bringing the Sentry Rocket you must be intending on using it for something else than a beachhead clearer - and it MUST have another use. Otherwise id rather just take a Tank/Battlecannon.

Granted its possible to have someone in a flying suit (IF YOU HAVE ONE) to go around the back, open the door each round you want to fire the sentry rocket, and it could work this way.

But that really sucks, I mean that person could be carrying a Launcher of their own with plasma rockets, or a grenade launcher with plasma grenades. The trick is the Sentry Rocket is available before those options (frankly I think I had the sentry before I had the rocket launcher itself, I dunno for sure)

Bootypedia does not suggest using the sentry as a beachhead tool.

Also:  With the addition of the waypoints a few months back, it went from being a pretty useless hunk of metal.

You mean to tell me it didnt have waypoints from the beginning? I figured it had more and they got reduced to 2.

See, this is the reason why im making a custom mod on top of x-piratez, to fix debacles like this. I think im going to turn the Sentry into a custom HWP without a turret. Some kinda thing that rolls around, and the whole thing rotates. Idea being that its so heavy and awkward it cant move fast, but is excellent for drawing fire and delivering those rockets (the rockets are a pretty big expenditure of materials at the point in the game where you get it, thats got to be useful in some way).

[ivandogovich]

@RSSwizard :
I've got a stand a-lone smart sentry mod if you want to start work from there.  It was the first Sentry Gun with waypoints.  When Dioxine incorporated it into the main mod he reduced waypoints from 3 to 2.

Piratez Extended / [MOD] Smart Sentry Gun

[legionof1]

The severity of the problem back then was pretty big. Landing at terror sites and supply ships often faced you with the problem of tank or mini nuke looking directly into your open craft. ANY action aside from inventory manipulation would trigger a reaction shot that could wipe out your entire craft. Doing nothing would also result in mass casualties. Considering you had 18 gals on the line it sucked. So rather then force save scumming, Dioxine offered a then super low tech tree solution(month 1). Now almost none of the factors that caused the problem exist anymore.


You and ivan are about the only people i have even heard talk about using it in months. To most of us it's probably a weird relic of yester year. It still retains being a sturdy platform with a powerful and accurate attack at lowish tech tree position. But it is no longer nearly as impactful on the game when it comes ~menace class as opposed to first 2-3 weeks.

[greattuna]

So it's 18th month in my campaign, and I attended to my first mutant pogrom and a sea adventure.

Pogrom was pretty intense, despite having only "weak" humanists. I had only 6 gals and 2 slave soldiers (who were reduced to healing duty, because these stats...) ready, and shortage of hands really reared it's ugly head there. Just too many people to handle properly, so in the end I lost two hands and got a ridiculous situation when everyone sans two scarab pilots were in sickbay.

And the sea adventure was... not really worth the risk this time. Dagger, rapier, bone club, wand of rending and 1 (one) silver bar is kind of lackluster for having to pit my troops against enemies who can one-shot them (thank god for spikeballs, they really helped out ^{inb4 spikeballs can't be used on underwater missions anymore}), and it makes me want to not do them missions until they become really safe.


EDIT: Well, fuck. Just as I was sending my turtle to raid a downed civvie ship, SUDDENLY an assault transport appeared and went straight for my base. I think it's over, since yeah, only two gals are active (everyone else is either in turtle, or in sickbay).

EDIT 2: it's mercenaries. Any hope I had for a good defence was very much dashed. Time to start anew, I guess.

[desert]

Dunno what this low-tech sentry is supposed to be. Never seen anything related to that.

And for Eurosyndicate missions: are you supposed to lose score on the order of ~1000  no matter if you capture everyone, kill everyone, or a mix?

If there's no distinct reward for the mission, then it definitely makes sense to compensate yourself by capturing rather than killing.

What are the consequences of "not complying" with the mission assignment in the first place? Does the Syndicate attack your base? Stop selling you their guns? Actually cut your funding (since all funding changes by country normally seem to be random)?

[legionof1]

Dunno what this low-tech sentry is supposed to be. Never seen anything related to that.

And for Eurosyndicate missions: are you supposed to lose score on the order of ~1000  no matter if you capture everyone, kill everyone, or a mix?

If there's no distinct reward for the mission, then it definitely makes sense to compensate yourself by capturing rather than killing.

What are the consequences of "not complying" with the mission assignment in the first place? Does the Syndicate attack your base? Stop selling you their guns? Actually cut your funding (since all funding changes by country normally seem to be random)?

Low tech is relative. Sentry is a smidgen after the menace class which used to be the start of play so pretty early compared to building your own tanks and such.

Not taking a syndicate hit is -1500 score. And yes certain configurations of the syndicate hits are functionally a loss of score either way because the units are all government troops with associated score.   

[Dioxine]

By advanced you must be talking about the 1800s, as in the 19th century. Before electricity. Its a history delving tech.

On what basis do you assume that? Why should gals play XIXth century reenactment? XiXth century is long dead and mostly forgotten.
For them this tech is the fruit of combining diplomacy, ideology, education and most of all, administration into something resembling a state with a self-identity; understand they're originally simple tribals. Electricity has nothing to do with it; Rome didn't have it and was civilized; and there are many uncivilized places nowadays.