A thread for little questions

[cc]

In the research tree, it shows all the prerequisites for a particular topic of research, is there a way to tell whether you need all of them or just one of them? I thought Power Tools needed BOTH Reticulan Power Systems and Chainsaw Good, but it just needs one or the other. Same with Gauss Weapons Dissassembly.

If the heading is "Unlocked By", you only need one.

[thevideogameraptorboggle]

Thank you. A little salty that I delayed getting Chainsaw Good for a year or so, but whatever.

[HT]

Soo, what's the purpose of being able to recruit slave soldiers early with that specific, exclusive research option when you can get them anyways with the Slavery Research topic? Does that one lock you out from hiring better Gals (Veteran and above) later on? How do these early male soldiers compare to Peasants?

[legionof1]

The trade off is cheap bought slave soldiers or the cheapest tier of gals. The soldiers otherwise need to be converted from regular slaves. Slave soldiers in terms of stat caps have slightly more hp and strength then peasants, but lower stamina. They have better initial stat range then peasants, but peasants have militia training option which narrows the gap alot.

Most of the difference is in outfits in the later game, SS have the doom armors, recon quad, and the testudo. Peasants have the ravenclaw. But that's just right now, peasants have fewer outfits in general due to lack of art assets, since someone other then Dioxine creates them. More are coming i presume.

There are some minor tech differences as well, but i wont spoil that info here.   

Edit: i also completely neglected to mention that slaves don't suffer morale decay, but they dont regen morale either(aside from morale after a panic and item use). It does make the slaves significantly less good with voodoo tools that cost morale to use, but better against psi attack on average.

[Alex the KatanaCutlass]

Hail, everyone.

I am a hard-core free time gamer with 35 yrs of experience and never saw a beauty like THIS, the X-PirateZ.
MARVELOUS! This game really deserves all the positive meaning superlatives one could think of.
I'd need some help/recommendations, however (YES, it's the Researching, what else could it be?. And crashing... The CTD.
SO:

1.) I'm now 13th in-game month, have 5 gals with great stats and an auxiliary 4 gals team I employ for less risky missions.
I have access to Tac Vests, Night Ops, and Assassin Armor (scavenged on my last mission). I have Krazy Hannah's hardware and Gun Emporium's stuff, I can make LACC ammo, etc, etc. So, am I armed well enough for this... hmm... age? What are your further recommendations for weapons and armor development?

2.) I have Jet Bikes with Seagulls for Interception, an Aircar and an Airvan for missions (Aircar is for intercepting small targets as well). I need a better combat Craft and weapons for it. Please advise me?

3.) My game (version Feb.2019) crashes every cca 10 saves. The error message says something like bad_alloc,
or it's just a blank error window.

Last, but not least: How would you direct the research and how? On one area to a certain depth, or in "a lttle bit of this, a little bit of that" style?
TYVM in advance, and every help is welcome.

PS: How do you fight Mercs? I tackled one of their ships, camped in my craft and fought from inside there, but when they blew up my door, I had to dustoff. Bah!

[Meridian]

3.) My game (version Feb.2019) crashes every cca 10 saves. The error message says something like bad_alloc,
or it's just a blank error window.

You need to upgrade to OXCE 5.3 or later: https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php/topic,5258.0.html

[cc]

2.) I have Jet Bikes with Seagulls for Interception, an Aircar and an Airvan for missions (Aircar is for intercepting small targets as well). I need a better combat Craft and weapons for it. Please advise me?

Search the tech tree for "Codex" and tech to that for a better craft. Plunder craft weapons for now or, if you want to, go for the Heavy Craft Weapons research.

Last, but not least: How would you direct the research and how? On one area to a certain depth, or in "a lttle bit of this, a little bit of that" style?

Directed research, mostly. Early key techs (in no particular order) are Krazy Hannah, Workshop, Chateau de la'Mort, Slavery, and a Codex craft of your choosing. Don't forget to pick up the Bag of Cash and Money Purse techs for increased profit.

PS: How do you fight Mercs? I tackled one of their ships, camped in my craft and fought from inside there, but when they blew up my door, I had to dustoff. Bah!

At your tech level? You don't. Run and live to fight another day.

[Alex the KatanaCutlass]

TYVM, Meridian and CC. MUCH appreciated.

Another question, please.
Would I have to start a new game after upgrading? I mean, would the old saves work?
And if they wouldn't work and I keep the old version with the now-and-then crashing saves, would it become unplayable one day?

[Meridian]

Would I have to start a new game after upgrading? I mean, would the old saves work?

No, you can continue.
Saves will work.

[legionof1]

We even have a pinned thread for when minor upgrade related problems occur.

[Alex the KatanaCutlass]

TYVM, gentlemen.
Can we somehow craft Seagull Missiles? They're quite expensive.
And, legionof1, I love your "Bullets go..."

So, I got OXCE... I guess I just put all the files where is my exe. file and rewrite it all. Directories only for me.
Pardon my dumb questions. I use 5 languages, but seldom do this kind 0' stuff.

Yea, you say SLAVERY is important?

EDITED:

Ppl, sorry to bother, but I need a step by step installation guide for the OXCE. I don't understand a thing. Is there a video on this?

It's the Windows 64 deal.

[Zharkov]

TYVM, gentlemen.
Can we somehow craft Seagull Missiles? They're quite expensive.
And, legionof1, I love your "Bullets go..."

And it has a deeper meaning: You need to be efficient to earn money. You cannot use expensive weapons to fight poor victims.  So unless you need some research items don't use Seagull Missiles, if they cost more than the expected loot.

[legionof1]

Okay, oxce how to, presuming an preexisting working install of the piratez mod:
1) download oxce file appropriate to your OS
2) Extract downloaded file
3) Delete the exe from your install folder as well as any shortcuts, since the version is different and named as such, so it wont overwrite by default. 
4) Copy the new .exe into your install, create new shortcuts as needed.

See if problem is resolved, if not continue

5)Copy and replace standard and common folder, not UFO or TFTD

If you have already copy and replaced the entire oxce download you will need to copy over the vanilla files over again. GEODATA, GEOGRAPH, MAPS, ROUTES, SOUND, TERRAIN, UFOGRAPH, UFOINTRO, and UNITS subfolders from the ufo folder of an install of vanilla, into the ufo folder of the Piratez install.

Other questions:
Slavery is important, slaves provide extra income and storage space, without using up valuable base tiles. And beyond that its a major tech gate itself in the areas of interrogating captives and expanding your contacts with the world.

No seagulls can't be crafted, some craft carry them as loot thou. That said seagulls arn't necessary for most lower tier air to air encounters, light craft weapons have much better mileage in the early game. Conserve your seagulls to engage harder targets.

[Eddie]

Ppl, sorry to bother, but I need a step by step installation guide for the OXCE. I don't understand a thing. Is there a video on this?

In case of Piratez you don't really need to install OXCE. You just need to replace the exe, at least that's what I did and it's working so far.
(If I'm suggesting bad things here Meridian will probably say so soonish.)

So, instructions:
- download OXCE, unpack.
- locate exe of OXCE
- put it in the folder where you current PirateZ exe is, use new exe from now on.

Future versions of PirateZ will have the fixed exe shipped with them. This exe replacement is only needed for J12.

Regarding research:
Krazy Hanna and Gun Emporium provide you with enough weapons. Weapon research at that stage will only give you more of the same.
Regarding armor, you are close to a major improvement over tac vests: tactical armor. It needs aqua plastics, smoke ops and and tinkering on top of Krazy Hanna that you already have. If you know how to use the tech tree viewer, you can look it up.

All better craft (interceptors and dropships) are locked behind the tiny drill research which eventually leads to shadowtech and the cloacking devices needed to build your own craft. For the tiny drill, this page should still be up to date: https://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php/Tiny_Drill_(Piratez)#How_to_advance_along_the_Tiny_Drill_branch
The most difficult part of this is to get the "Shadowmasters" tech. My recommandation here is to interrogate Hoes until you get it. They are easy to capture, interrogate fast and you can get a lot of them easily.

Then you will also stumble upon the question of codex choice, which is an entire subject of it's own...

[thevideogameraptorboggle]

How do I upgrade from Tactical Armor? What's the next upgrade for generic all purpose armor, that doesn't need Power Armor Parts?