Re: The X-Com Files - 3.5: Whispers In The Dark

[psavola]

If an agent is hit by an incendiary grenade, how do you put out the flames so that he does not lose health?

The flames often go off by themselves, so most of the time I don't bother. But you can use for example a Fire Extinguisher. It may make sense to have one or two as backup on missions. There are some other more complicated equipment that can do the same, but for beginners that is sufficient.

[Solarius Scorch]

Had an Arbiter craft mission yesterday. OMG, coolest craft ever. One of the toughest missions as well. Like 8 to 12 Sectopods. These are really enjoyable missions. Tough but tons of fun.
Great job on those.

<3

If an agent is hit by an incendiary grenade, how do you put out the flames so that he does not lose health?

Apart from the Fire Extinguisher which Psavola mentioned (or the one mounted on the Medical Drone), you can also use a Chempistol/Chemogun loaded with an Extinguisher Tank.

[theophilos]

Apologies for dumb n00b questions:

1. Is there a way to heal ONESELF with the starting medical equipment? I thought I saw on playthroughs, people healing wounds with their own kit before, but I can't seem to do that myself. Perhaps it is a later equipment?

2. Looking at the beginner's lightning stun rod, it appears 1 handed, because stats for nerds never mentions it being 2 handed. Is there really zero negatives at all to hold it and a pistol at the same time? Is there likewise zero issue holding a regular pistol and a tazer at the same time lol

3. If I forgot to research in the first month should I restart 

4. What button can you use to quickly armor people up? I saw on a video someone was able to click a single button to equip armor on a lot of crew, rather than have to open list every person

5. Is it generally best to spread out researchers rather than pile them into one thing unless need to rush something? I heard for each one assigned they become slightly less effecient.

6. Is there much point researching really terrible outdate equipment /melee weapons like a baseball bat

7. Is there a limit on how much you can bring on public transport? I am paranoid that I am missing things that I assign

8. I am enjoying the mod great job

[Juku121]

Is there a way to heal ONESELF with the starting medical equipment?

Perhaps it is a later equipment?

Yes, healing sprays. The first version comes relatively early, from an obvious branch of the tech tree.

I'm not entirely sure why it's only those that can be self-applied, and use personal settings where a lot of other kits work on the user, but take a lot more TU as well.

Looking at the beginner's lightning stun rod, it appears 1 handed, because stats for nerds never mentions it being 2 handed. Is there really zero negatives at all to hold it and a pistol at the same time? Is there likewise zero issue holding a regular pistol and a tazer at the same time lol

If you mean the stun club, yes, that's one-handed. Generally, pistols have no penalty, but you can always check by saving, dropping the other gun and observing any accuracy changes.

The only real 'penalty' I know of is which gun gets used for reaction fire. You can right-click on them in the Battlescape to prioritise one over the other.

If I forgot to research in the first month should I restart

Probably? It's not a game ender, but you do want good progress and losing one month of gameplay is much less of a problem than three months, or a year, or...

What button can you use to quickly armor people up?

Right-click.

Is it generally best to spread out researchers rather than pile them into one thing unless need to rush something? I heard for each one assigned they become slightly less effecient.

Each one assigned is not less efficient per se, but research gets done in dayly 'batches' and any overflow is lost. So in practice, putting a lot of eggheads on one topic is likely to waste science-days. Then again, if you always research everything with just one guy, you'll never get anywhere at an acceptable pace. So you need to strike a balance.

Quick fluffy topics like the one million conventional guns and blades, low-tier cultists, etc can be left to one scientist. New transport craft, big guns, heavy armour, fighter jets, not so much.

Is there much point researching really terrible outdate equipment /melee weapons like a baseball bat

A little bit of score, convenient access to its stats in-game, including during battle, completionism. And you never know that this weapon isn't actually useful due to some weird quirk. Old melee weapons are surprisingly OP, to the point a buff agent with a big axe can just hack through supposedly near-indestructible UFO walls.

Is there a limit on how much you can bring on public transport? I am paranoid that I am missing things that I assign

In theory, there can be limits on how much crap you can assign onto a craft, but I don't remember if that was a thing in XCF at some point. Doesn't seem to be ATM. Edit: Yeah, very recent change to remove them again, see below. /edit

Looted stuff is magically transported to your base by friendly Council Salvagers.

[Solarius Scorch]

Version 3.1 has been released.

3.1:
- New missions: Cereal Cult, Agent Wilheard's Voyage.
- New terrain: Cargo Ship (reworked from TFTD).
- New weapon: Rift Staff.
- New ammo: Dart Pistol Anti-E115 Clip, Dart Rifle Anti-E115 Clip.
- New units: Ghost Eye, Phantasmal Tentacle, Agent Wilheard.
- New cities: Marrakesh, Antalya, Aleppo, Naples, Glasgow, Sarajevo, Chisinau.
- New country: Serbia.
- New agent nationality: Serbian.
- New dossier: Agent Wilheard.
- New Apocalypse legend: Red Moon Curse.
- 4 new events (some by Dioxine).
- New Ufopaedia section: Martial Techniques.
- New Ufopaedia articles.
- Added Dr. Hadriex combat analysis page.
- 3 new Caves maps (2 by Dioxine).
- New firing sounds.
- Warp weapons damage armor.
- Reworked dart clips B and C into acid and electric clips respectively.
- Kludge and Mateba have slightly worse snap ranges.
- .454 Casull Ammo has Firing Accuracy bonus, but worse armor penetration.
- Monsters Inc. Files are cheaper to sell.
- Dogs have some anti-camouflage.
- Minotaurs can be tamed by X-Com (base defense only).
- Hell Cruise with Dr. Hadriex uses Cargo Ship terrain.
- Disabled most missions from spawning in the first month.
- Added retaliation variants to automatic retaliations.
- More retaliation race tiers.
- Extra rewards on some missions.
- Ignoring Dimension X defence missions is more costly.
- Hybrid convoys actually travel now.
- Combat analysis is now usually unlocked by autopsy.
- Decreased unpriming costs for most explosives.
- Marker is Concealable.
- Boombox is faster.
- Taser now has snap shots.
- Dart Musket is buyable.
- Klein Bottle Grenade is deconstructable.
- Removed craft item limits (due to bad interaction with Apocalypse-like item management).
- Sanity requirement Martial Arts Training lowered.
- Some name lists reviewed and improved (by Ivan Sanchez).
- Caves tweaks (by Dioxine).
- Seaside grass is shorter.
- Almost all commendations are initially hidden.
- Better Outdated Weapons picture.
- Overhauled briefing colors.
- Added mini-icons for the Liquidator (by Dioxine).
- Added missing articles on various built-in attacks.
- Fixed Sectopod minigun.
- Fixed Ghost Terror Blast.
- Fixed Hungarian area.
- Fixed Chief Accountant introduction texts.
- Fixed Master of X description.
- Fixed retreating from the Syndicate HQ.
- Minor fixes (thanks to Emil J. Schroeder).

WARNING: If you upgrade mid-campaign, you will lose all your dart ammunition. Better sell it before the update!

[DeltaEpsilon]

1. Is there a way to heal ONESELF with the starting medical equipment? I thought I saw on playthroughs, people healing wounds with their own kit before, but I can't seem to do that myself. Perhaps it is a later equipment?

Healing sprays.

2. Looking at the beginner's lightning stun rod, it appears 1 handed, because stats for nerds never mentions it being 2 handed. Is there really zero negatives at all to hold it and a pistol at the same time? Is there likewise zero issue holding a regular pistol and a tazer at the same time lol

Yes, if both weapons are one-handed, you're set. To quickly know if a weapon is one or two handed, see if there is a small 2 at the bottom right corner. Red means you can only use with empty other hand, green means there is an accuracy penalty.

If I forgot to research in the first month should I restart 

It's not exactly run-ending, but the game does force you to rush. I would recommend restarting.

What button can you use to quickly armor people up? I saw on a video someone was able to click a single button to equip armor on a lot of crew, rather than have to open list every person

Armor up one unit in the armor screen, then press right click to copy last armor onto this unit.

Is it generally best to spread out researchers rather than pile them into one thing unless need to rush something? I heard for each one assigned they become slightly less effecient.

Each research topic has a specific research time. Each scientist assigned to the topic deducts from it once a day. So, you should assign N researchers only if N divides the research time.
To know the research time, middle click the topic and check top left -- the time here is displayed with symbols like . - = #.
. means 1 day, - means 5 days, = means 20, # means 100. Add them up and you get the time.

So, for a research with == (40 man-days), you should assign only either 1, 2, 4, 5, 8, 10, 20 or 40 scientists. All numbers that divide 40 days.

6. Is there much point researching really terrible outdate equipment /melee weapons like a baseball bat

Score and, thus, money. Additionally there are some (melee) weapons that stay good throughout.

7. Is there a limit on how much you can bring on public transport? I am paranoid that I am missing things that I assign

Not in OXCE. There was in the original game, but no longer present here.

[Juku121]

Not in OXCE. There was in the original game, but no longer present here.

Akshully... Craft item limits were reintroduced sometime in 2020, and have been present in XCF for a while. Just got removed, in fact.

I've always removed or upped them myself, so I didn't remember off-hand.

[DeltaEpsilon]

Oh, well, I have only played XCF in 2018 or so and this month, so I missed all of this then. But yeah, current ones have been negated looks like, every craft has 9999 slots.

[Juku121]

Current ones have virtually unlimited slots. Used to be 999 for a while.

I just put 30 million and change stapler boxes onto a Land Rover as a test. The UI is starting to have trouble handling such numbers, but the car trunk is fine.

[Vakrug]

- New country: Serbia.

Always wanted to ask: do you plan to add every single country into the game? With each added new country the game actually becomes slightly easier, since aliens do secret pacts at the same rate, also less chances to sign a pact with someone significant.

[theophilos]

Thank you Delta and Juku for your replies,

1. I saw in tech tree topic search the intelligence center requires figuring out the basic gangs existence, while the bio lab requires medicine track.

In my playthrough, after briefly getting distracted attempted to get better armor (I stopped just short of kevlar vests, want to do that soon thgough) I instead diverted to go do bio lab first, and then beeline to intelligence center (Aiming for these things only hoping to get more scientist slots than 5, as soon as I saw there are a million research topics lol)

Without telling me the best absolute way to start, how would you rate this plan from POOR up to EXCELLENT  I just want to know if this was a catastrophic idea to do it in this order

2. Does researching regular weapons change how well they can be used? I have a AK-47 unresearched but when I tried it from a dead guy it seemed pretty junk and I stuck with shotguns and pistol loadouts lol. I assume aliens weapons of course are unusable without certain techs

3. is it a good idea to get a second base pretty quickly? For now I just been saving money hoping to build bio lab and intelligence center, and then try to build second base

4. In the gym, what does the + button actually do? I see stats change when clicking but idk what it means. Also, some agents that I think are assigned as pilots, cannot be in the gym perhaps? They have a plus or minus thing next to name but again I am unsure what that does

Thanks for help with my basic questions

[Chuckebaby]

That new MIB Lunar Mission is insane. Was like 114 kills in total (parts 1+2). the mapping is also really good.
Honestly wasn't sure I was going to make it. Lost a lot of good guys. Part 2 was nearly impossible on beginner. 

I wont give away any spoilers, just wanted to give a thumbs up for the great new bling. This was a tough one. Mission also took me a good part of two hours.

[Juku121]

questions

Well, Biolabs, a second base and Promo I are the best opening goals I know, so I'd say you're doing well.

For most weapons, research just allows you to by them and, more importantly, their ammo. There are some weapons that gate certain research topics, though, but it's not the Makarovs and AKs that do this.

Even poor looted guns can be good, though. AKs have both range, some armour penetration and auto-fire for close-up work, even if they're crappy as assault rifles go. You need a well-trained agent for a PA shotgun to compete with that at range.

And there will be much better looted stuff later. Not even that much later. You'll hate it when it gets used against your agents, though.

A second base gives you better transport coverage, whether via a second team or transferring, but it's a lot more costly. Research is not the ultimate measure of progress, though, so there's a balance to be struck here, again. If you think the Battlescape part is under control, I'd go for a base. If not, research things that will help with that.

The + button toggles between 'natural' and 'bonus' stats (commendations and transformations).

The '+' next to an agent's name is there because they can't participate in training, but they're ordered to do so when they can. Usually that's because they're wounded. Otherwise, they can train even while piloting a jet fighter on the other side of the globe. X-Com has some super-advanced training methods.

[psavola]

There are at least two ways to go. Whether to build a second base quickly and build bio and intel labs there. Or try to push for promo II and science lab quickly, which will be better value for money and allow increasing research throughput significantly.

In my recent SH campaign, I think I delayed building a second base and concentrated on improving the main base (the absolute requirement then is getting science lab as soon as possible), even saving some money to be ready for the science lab (2M + a lot to hire the scientists the next month) if there was not a good use for it. If you get missions on the other side of the globe, just use a private car to get then in time and abort the mission. You can cover about half the globe with a helicopter anyway. I don't think you actually need a real global reach until you are ready to deal with cult outposts.

[Fiskun1]

Today I met the Black Lotus ninja for the first time. It cost me a lot of nerves. As far as I understand, they cannot be seen from a distance, you need to approach somewhere by 5 cells. How to fight this enemy more effectively?