Extended Piratez general FAQ/Strategy Guide

[DracoGriffin]

Meridian has disabled the Amiga font I am using with Piratez, that's all.

Are you sure? I get the question mark as well and didn't disable any fonts.

[Dioxine]

You get the question mark, along with fancy Pedia fonts, if you don't disable them. Meridian reverted them to the boring original ones.

[niculinux]

In the meantime, to get the infinite manufacture, press CTRL + Left Mouse Button the feature is not listed in  the "Hidden Features" wiki page, maybe a mention is worthy.

As for amiga fonts, according to the related page on the mod portal the mod replaces three files:

• FontSmall.png
• FontBig.png and
• Font.dat

into the

Code: [Select]

data/Language directories, for openxcom extended it's all inside the

Code: [Select]

/common/Language/ instead so i guess these have to be replaced with the ones in a vanilla openxcom installation. There is no other way around?

[Cristao]

You just need to press the left mouse button on the up arrow to get the infinite manufacture - no need to press control.

[niculinux]

Tank you Cristao! Well to disabke amiga fonts seems enough tomselect a different video filter, raw. For the purpose please note that Meridian very kindly has even provided a config file used in his x-piratex playthrough we may dowload by going here!

as a personal hint, usin a whole new soundtrack to play the mkd is mandatory, i use  gifty's new x-com music, it feels a brand new game, plus it ill throw you back in the '90, very very cool work!

[Dioxine]

Yeah I'm playing with Gifty's music myself.

[niculinux]

Well...no selecting raw won't solve the problem, the solution is in the upper post where there is talking about the files in language folder, plobably

Hey, are there any keys to bring, while viewing the geoscape, the hideout screen such as research, manufacture and so on? Like happens with th bootypedia (pressing u) 

Edit: typo

[Arthanor]

If you go into options on the staring screen, then controls, you will find a list of all the shortcuts available, which also are configurable. That's also in regular OpenXCom btw.

[vlad]

just downloaded the mod and used it for about 4-5 hours and now i have few questions :

1) on my first play on easiest i had first pogrom. everything went fine until i ran into armored car that massacred the gals so fast no pleasure house can deliver me substitutes. what do you use against such high armor types in the very beginning ?

2) on next play, i gave myself a bit of advantage of money just to last longer than few days and see whats the game about. i made some progress and managed to shot down couple of shippings. now on one with academics and highlanders (?) on desert i accidently shot probably oil tank. but to my suprise there was like 5 minutes of kaboom over what i previously expected to be broken wing. was that leaked oil ? does it destroy people/items when doing so ?

after that i missed few ships, as i am unable to catch them and/or afraid i will burn nuclear fuel for trying to catch them. but then pogrom appeared. i have seen the new building types and layouts before, but now actually playing them for the first time is kinda pain to me. having to run few stocks with stairs on opposite sides and multiple doors on the way made my devoted gal searching the house do that whole my battlescape time till my advance crew made it to other side of map, killed bunch of non-mutants (ehm). that also rised few needs and questions :

3) what is early accessible weapon for making holes into the buildings ? i didnt have much success with shottys and cant really blow things up on pogroms. some all around use weapon with ability to make wall holes ?

4) i managed to find hidden plasmadisc on the very far end of map, but many mutants tend to run there. i tried to stun them, do they still count as dead by my hand when i end with them stunned ?

5) standard abilities and stat training applies ? aka run a lot for stamina ?

6) there are some items that i can buy on black market but i dont know what they are. there is no bootypedia record for them. i suspect i need to buy it first, brain it and then i will know what they are for, is that right ?

7) slavery produces storage space, but slaves go where ? into storage itself ? or barracks ? are slaves endless expansion of storage ?

i think this covers my question so far, any piece of advice is welcomed. i just didnt want to jump into mod that would play sp:waw type, still not sure this one is or isnt that.

edit :
7.9) what i am missing a lot is pre-battle equip with no info of how loaded the gal actually is. or is it not important ? do i need to turn it on somewhere ?

[DracoGriffin]

just downloaded the mod and used it for about 4-5 hours and now i have few questions :

1) on my first play on easiest i had first pogrom. everything went fine until i ran into armored car that massacred the gals so fast no pleasure house can deliver me substitutes. what do you use against such high armor types in the very beginning ?

Explosives. Big explosives. Think like Panzerfaust explosives. Or mortars. or RPGs.

2) on next play, i gave myself a bit of advantage of money just to last longer than few days and see whats the game about. i made some progress and managed to shot down couple of shippings. now on one with academics and highlanders (?) on desert i accidently shot probably oil tank. but to my suprise there was like 5 minutes of kaboom over what i previously expected to be broken wing. was that leaked oil ? does it destroy people/items when doing so ?

after that i missed few ships, as i am unable to catch them and/or afraid i will burn nuclear fuel for trying to catch them. but then pogrom appeared. i have seen the new building types and layouts before, but now actually playing them for the first time is kinda pain to me. having to run few stocks with stairs on opposite sides and multiple doors on the way made my devoted gal searching the house do that whole my battlescape time till my advance crew made it to other side of map, killed bunch of non-mutants (ehm). that also rised few needs and questions :

Cheating isn't cool and you will learn nothing from it. Your expectations of X-Com "quickly shoot every ship" will ruin you; don't do that. Piratez is meant to have a MUCH LONGER playthrough than vanilla X-Com (which can be beaten before end of first year). If you miss some or even a lot, THAT'S O-K. Just relax, you are a pirate. Go for the easy targets. If a ship looks slow enough for the Bonaventura to follow, do so (and hope for it to land).

3) what is early accessible weapon for making holes into the buildings ? i didnt have much success with shottys and cant really blow things up on pogroms. some all around use weapon with ability to make wall holes ?

Explosives or hammer. Hammer is great for breaking down walls, just be ready to have someone else run through the hole, not the person with the hammer (they will have no TU/energy to do anything but be shot to death).

4) i managed to find hidden plasmadisc on the very far end of map, but many mutants tend to run there. i tried to stun them, do they still count as dead by my hand when i end with them stunned ?

That's a cyberdisc. And no idea about stunning the civilians. Haven't bothered to test it.

5) standard abilities and stat training applies ? aka run a lot for stamina ?

Yep... except for the run a lot for stamina part. That... that has never been a thing in X-Com. Walking around does not improve your stats in any way, no matter how much you do. Energy/stamina is a secondary stat that is only improved when a primary stat improves (Reactions/Firing/Melee, etc).

6) there are some items that i can buy on black market but i dont know what they are. there is no bootypedia record for them. i suspect i need to buy it first, brain it and then i will know what they are for, is that right ?

If you don't know what they are used for, 99% of the time you don't need it just yet. However, pretty sure 99% of the stuff on the Black Market is in your Bootypedia.

7) slavery produces storage space, but slaves go where ? into storage itself ? or barracks ? are slaves endless expansion of storage ?

Not sure how you got to slavery so fast considering your other questions, strange but ok! Slaves are storage items (don't require a Barracks) that grant "negative storage" just as you surmised, so yes, they can become an infinite storage pool (to the point where you can have negative storage space if you have enough). However, generally you will only achieve this if you are savescumming/cheating or just farming a ton of easy ships. (Nothing wrong with that as you can still get plenty of $$$ from Ship Engines/Slave AIs/Plastasteel/Nuclear Fuel)

7.9) what i am missing a lot is pre-battle equip with no info of how loaded the gal actually is. or is it not important ? do i need to turn it on somewhere ?

You can modify the loadout of your pirateson the Vessels -> Bonaventura -> Equipment screens. Or before any battle. And yes, how they are loaded is very important. If you are talking about WEIGHT, yes, that is also important as pirates will begin to lose TUs on their following turn dependent upon how over-encumbered they are. Which is why Runt is a great armor for low Strength pirates.

[Solarius Scorch]

Can you please specify which Black Market items lack Bootypedia entries? I think there shouldn't be such items.

As for the plane wreck blowing up, it's a "feature" introduced in the latest release and it will disappear from the next one, so you were fairly unlucky to see that.

[vlad]

Lets just handle the cheating part first, as that seems to be the issue around here. I am new to the mod and i dont want to spend hours moving troops around field to see what the game looks like and failing on inability to maintain some production income to see if i want to use the mod. I do use selective playtesting over repetition - aka ignoring part of the game (mod) i am not interested in right now to focus on parts that i would like to know more about. One of them was tech tree, other was general combat and some basic mechanics. All that is hinted in introduction, first part of support paragraph and conclusion. I dont feel like being overwhelmed by stuff at once is a good way to be introduced to a new thing and general procedure of teaching supports that. That also covers why i gave myself cash, got so fast to slavery, ignored melee combat and didnt micromanage money part.

Explosives. Big explosives. Think like Panzerfaust explosives. Or mortars. or RPGs.

Got it. I was trying to use stuff i have cos money seems to be issue. Thats why i was stucked with "assualt cannon" and some "black powder bombs". I wasnt packing those two items anyway, it was totally "i didnt pack right" moment.

Explosives or hammer.

Good, will employ one or two gals having backpacked or equiped hammer just for that, tried fusion torch too, but seems to have really expensive clip to make it into normal equip for build breaching. I also stumbled upon

4 Breaching Charge and 5 Tranquilizer by Civilian

just dont know if its in game and accessible early on.

That's a cyberdisc

except for the run a lot for stamina part. That... that has never been a thing in X-Com.

Sure. I wasnt expecting to have the same name as in classic xcom, so i was merely describing it, my bad.
Also totally wrong on the stats part. Also my bad.

If you are talking about WEIGHT

Exactly. When i get to loading outfit, i dont have access to bootypedia anymore or even in mission if i want to exchange stuff not to lose TUs on round start - see picture in attached files.

Can you please specify which Black Market items lack Bootypedia entries? I think there shouldn't be such items.

The problem was different. I think that i was able to buy "medical supplies" before knowing them. aka i bought them, then researched to know what they are used for. i was just checking if that is true or i simply overlooked something, as buying stuff for research would be new.

As for the plane wreck blowing up, it's a "feature" introduced in the latest release and it will disappear from the next one, so you were fairly unlucky to see that.

sadly i dont have any picture, but it was standard ufo hull with real-plane-like torso (with stairs going to upper decks) tossed all around the ufo . and some barrels around and something i considered wings, but i think it was actually oil. looked pretty steelly and probably the shape was just coincidence. i am assuming that from the time and type of explosion and that the "wing" was gone after that. anyway it was quite surprising to encounter such thing first time.

Also i might have missplaced my question, if this is more suited for  general question thread feel free to move it there, ty.

[Arthanor]

Lets just handle the cheating part first, as that seems to be the issue around here. I am new to the mod and i dont want to spend hours moving troops around field to see what the game looks like and failing on inability to maintain some production income to see if i want to use the mod. I do use selective playtesting over repetition - aka ignoring part of the game (mod) i am not interested in right now to focus on parts that i would like to know more about. One of them was tech tree, other was general combat and some basic mechanics. All that is hinted in introduction, first part of support paragraph and conclusion. I dont feel like being overwhelmed by stuff at once is a good way to be introduced to a new thing and general procedure of teaching supports that. That also covers why i gave myself cash, got so fast to slavery, ignored melee combat and didnt micromanage money part.

Most of us play the mod to make things more difficult and also to live the experience/challenge/torture that Dioxine crafted into his mod. Since cheating changes the experience significantly and deprives you of a fair amount of the challenge/torture, yes, it is sort of frowned upon. It just makes your experience much less relevant for discussion because it is so different from that of others. I believe that if you cheat (and admit to it/get caught), you are a target for teasing. Draco's reaction might have been a bit strong (you're free to cheat, it's a single player game and what you do has no influence on my enjoyment, so I wouldn't outright discourage it like he did) but in the context of discussing the mod it wasn't totally off.

Got it. I was trying to use stuff i have cos money seems to be issue. Thats why i was stucked with "assualt cannon" and some "black powder bombs". I wasnt packing those two items anyway, it was totally "i didnt pack right" moment.

HE, Panzerfausts and mortar rounds are indeed expensive and an issue. Using them as abundantly as you would HE packs and large rockets in vanilla XCom will cost you lots of cash that might be better spent elsewhere. But you indeed need a few to take out some terror units. In the early game, rpgs (cheaper rounds and ok damage, if worst accuracy) and HE Packs are my favourites. Panzerfauts are really costly. Note that armored cars and cyberdiscs are not immune to fire. A flamethrower can work surprisingly well to take them out (especially cyberdiscs die rather quickly, armored cars require a fair few hits)

Good, will employ one or two gals having backpacked or equiped hammer just for that, tried fusion torch too, but seems to have really expensive clip to make it into normal equip for build breaching.

Read the bootypedia. There's a big discrepancy in damage values. The hammer will smash most normal walls, but not UFO walls, that's what the fusion torch is for, and that's why it's so expensive: making your own UFO doors wherever is convenient has its cost (and in-universe, you need something hi-tech and powerful to punch through UFO hulls).

I also stumbled upon  just dont know if its in game and accessible early on.

Not sure, as those are mods for vanilla that were introduced in Piratez as side mods. This is more of a case of "fit in where you think is right" and depending on users will probably vary from "available at the black market" to "restricted to end game".

Exactly. When i get to loading outfit, i dont have access to bootypedia anymore or even in mission if i want to exchange stuff not to lose TUs on round start - see picture in attached files.

I'm not sure what the problem is? You can tell from the number you just showed how much stuff a gal carries, which will tell you if she will lost TUs on her next turn (anything above 1, say 55/54, and she will lose TUs). You can't tell the weight of items in the inventory screen except by having a gal pick it up and seeing how much her total weight went up by.

The problem was different. I think that i was able to buy "medical supplies" before knowing them. aka i bought them, then researched to know what they are used for. i was just checking if that is true or i simply overlooked something, as buying stuff for research would be new.

Yup, there is some stuff in the market that you don't know about. It is one of the ways to discover them. For medical supplies specifically, you can also discover them when raiding shipping. No matter how you acquire them, you can then research them.

sadly i dont have any picture, but it was standard ufo hull with real-plane-like torso (with stairs going to upper decks) tossed all around the ufo . and some barrels around and something i considered wings, but i think it was actually oil. looked pretty steelly and probably the shape was just coincidence. i am assuming that from the time and type of explosion and that the "wing" was gone after that. anyway it was quite surprising to encounter such thing first time.

And if you upgrade to the latest mod/patch, it won't happen any more. Apparently it is an odd thing from TftD which indeed is surprising because it makes no sense. Now the plane should no longer explode like crazy.[/quote]

[DracoGriffin]

If I came off too strong, oops? I'm not trying to.

But honestly, cheating will completely miss up how you play this mod. Essentially you should be killing blindly (for the most part) in the beginning because you shouldn't have learned about slavery so fast, which once researched and learned, becomes a much stronger component to battles: "Do I go for the risky stun to enslave/research/sell or just kill?"

And it's unfortunate that people feel the need to cheat; the whole aspect is meant to be unknown and exploring it. Just as many veterans love the feel of X-Com and research and "ooh what's next" or "wow, that's new", so too does Piratez offer this in spades.

I understand the whole "hey it's single player and my free time, so I'll cheat if I want/need" aspect like Arthanor touched on, but you're just cheating yourself out of the experience of the mod. Learning from mistakes, understanding the mechanics, trying new things (instead of going in with the vanilla X-Com mindset of things) are what make the mod great.

I dont feel like being overwhelmed by stuff at once is a good way to be introduced to a new thing and general procedure of teaching supports that. That also covers why i gave myself cash, got so fast to slavery, ignored melee combat and didnt micromanage money part.

This is what I am referring to specifically: that's the point of the mod in the early game. To feel completely overwhelmed, to be completely lost and unsure of things. And ignoring melee? That's such a critical and huge part of the game (and generally the first lesson new players are taught about Piratez). Also, managing money is another hurdle: don't expect huge influx from countries like vanilla X-Com; you are a pirate, not a private security force for hire. Pirates lie and steal; and as you explore the mod deeper, you'll find most moneymaking efforts support this. (Counterfeit money, bootleg alcohol empire, industrializing firearms and armaments

If I came off strong, again, not my intention. I answered your questions, some of them were legitimate, others were from incorrect beliefs. My only suggestion would be more specific as others can only answer them as well as they are asked.

[Dioxine]

Well, I do despise cheaters, but that's because they're just a waste of players; they will get little to none satisfaction from playing the mod it took me so much work to make, and then can say nothing meaningful about the experience. In reality, a cheater in a single-player game just cheats himself out of most of the pleasure from playing it, so the real victim is himself, but I still feel negative emotions. I won't hide them, even if I fully support the notion that every user has the right to do whatever they want with the program.