Author Topic: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)  (Read 10592 times)

Offline rezaf

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Re: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)
« Reply #15 on: July 31, 2018, 07:37:15 pm »
I feel this thread is kinda enlightening in how even veterans of the mod experienced enough to set themselves pretty ridiculous goals like "no ranged weapons" can struggle with some of the basic design decisions. Maybe some of them ought to be adjusted?

Nobody likes topic spammers, so it's always a hurdle to open up a thread like this, especially for a green player whose experience is somewhat fresher. Maybe there should be an AAR subforum especially intended for such reports - I know I saw something like that in other game forums.
I'd leave my impressions here, but I don't wanna hijack legions thread.  ;)

Offline legionof1

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Re: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)
« Reply #16 on: July 31, 2018, 11:52:20 pm »
Well not no ranged weapons, that would be impossible. Just no firearms.

Offline legionof1

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Re: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)
« Reply #17 on: August 01, 2018, 06:51:38 pm »
Report 4: It was fun while it lasted.

Okay this report covers what turned out to be the final 6 and half months of the run.

RNGebus came forth and smote my ass, in December with both a sway government and 2 bases tanking my score and income, and then 6 days into january the main base got curb stomped by stargod retaliation. I might be able to salvage the run and eventually continue but losing the main base along with the menace craft and the best gals is a massive blow that might result in a game over from score anyway as i was already on warning for Decembers debacle. At the very least my research ability is fucked into oblivion. Gonna take 4 million and 20 days of building to get back to the 3 brainer level i started with. So loss of main base means no research infamy this month, and i've got the drain from the 2 active bases to counter. And pogroms are fully active and my ability to fight them just died.

Even if was using the full arsenal at my disposal, 3 sectopods and invisible friends would probably still have wiped the main base, when the best armor i have built is chainmail, and the only feasible options researched for the sectopods are either try to gangbang them with spiked maces, or blow them and half of the base into tiny bits with chinese dragons. So even the best case scenario still puts the main base completely out of action while it rebuilds from collateral or sacrifice most of the gals to the spiked mace plan and hope the survivors can clean up.

And things had been going decently well before i had thought. Back to school was done and i was only missing a live psi user capture to get graduation. The academy was being a bit stingy on there spawns until the bases popped in December, with a live academy base i fully expected to be able to extract an esper or provost and escape then come back with bigger toys. I had just gotten storm marine armor unlocked when the stargods got me.

In the end i was probably far to cautious with my mission selection, 2 year timer to be able to handle stargods without obliterating yourself is actually kinda steep with how slow the early game RNG can make progression.

Speaking to progression getting voodoo started seems rather difficult.
Provost, esper, human mage, magical girl, reticulan elder, Raynerd, or liber occultus translation are the options.
Provost is top tier academy so rather rare in the early game, esper less rare but still not very frequent.
Human mage is an even more rare option considering they will only be on high speed rarely spawning civilian craft, or at least that the only source i know of before the red mage arc which is post voodoo anyway.
Magical girl means getting the ships of love to start spawning and the finding one in all the air traffic without decoders, and thats post workshop, so at least a few months or in my case a year into play.
Elder....so either catch an appropriate probe, trigger a reticulation retaliation, or get the saya prize, you are more likely to see Raynerd before any of these happen.
Reynerd, this ones fairly assured to spawn, but getting up to bounty B takes a not insignificant amount of time.
Liber translation, well 1 book and one reverend minimum, or more likely 2 of one and one of the other, seems rare to me.
Best bet seems to be hitting mansions and every distress call trying for the esper.

Speaking of espers they are a big obstruction to progress with the dr X arc. You can't get the hideout without one alive, glad this is only the secondary route to Sci books.

Getting into the air is still an exercise in RNG, or throw a ton of money at missiles, but past the intial bootstrap issues its pretty manageable. It does however make green codex charger laser really attractive as the only craft weapon fully functional from the tiny drill project. Red codex starts with no ammo and needs a big slug of mutant alliance tokens to unlock purchase. Grey is running on expensive seagulls but needs very few, and gold is running on well gold and starts with 20 shots. Red gets the short end of the stick.   

As far as the no firearms challenge i set myself, its remarkably doable, a flexible variety of grenades is pretty easy to get, and javelin and throwing axes are pretty effective. Until the sectopods nothing was unmanageable. Even then maybe it could have been done in fewer numbers.

Hope you all enjoyed my ramblings. Guess ill try again being slightly less silly. Any interest in further reports of this AAR type from the next run?




Offline Ethereal_Medic

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Re: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)
« Reply #18 on: August 01, 2018, 07:34:21 pm »
Jack Sparrow Supermutant.
Anything else as you like.

Offline cc

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Re: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)
« Reply #19 on: August 01, 2018, 08:01:26 pm »
Speaking to progression getting voodoo started seems rather difficult.
Noblewoman can be gotten from the Escape Tower missions fairly easily. It's recommended to clear as much of the fluff topics away first for a higher chance to roll Voodoo, but that's how I did it.

Hope you all enjoyed my ramblings. Guess ill try again being slightly less silly. Any interest in further reports of this AAR type from the next run?
Sure. Always interesting to read how others play.

Offline legionof1

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Re: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)
« Reply #20 on: August 01, 2018, 08:22:19 pm »
Noblewoman can be gotten from the Escape Tower missions fairly easily. It's recommended to clear as much of the fluff topics away first for a higher chance to roll Voodoo, but that's how I did it.
snip

Human noblewoman doesn't count for the voodoo prerequisite. See screen shot. Yes you can get voodoo itself from the nobles get one free list but that's a list of 70 entries, and about a 5th of those are hard to clear out in a timely fashion, namely the Ancient log X and #X. so at best like 1 in 15 after clearing out the get one free list for a bunch of other sources. Sounds less reliable then finding an esper to me. Oh and what also has ancient logs in there list, Human mages and church reverends so back to the earlier mentions. Other sources include old earth books, which are in mansions or in the hands folks on higher tier ships which leads back to the provost and esper. Statistically the esper is the fastest/easiest route.
« Last Edit: August 01, 2018, 08:34:54 pm by legionof1 »

Offline BBHood217

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Re: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)
« Reply #21 on: August 02, 2018, 01:39:44 am »
You never got an Escape Tower bounty mission with a human mage?  That's just bad luck, like with those ethereals I guess.  Also, I don't think sectoids do crackdowns anymore.

Finally, other sources of espers are science vessels (which requires angering the Academy, much like how angering the Guild enables the heavy freighters) and Academy campuses.

Offline legionof1

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Re: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)
« Reply #22 on: August 02, 2018, 01:59:32 am »
I got one tower in 12 months it was in the pool, its a c rank. And funny thing about guild is alarmed/angry and campuses both require a live esper first.

Offline Ethereal_Medic

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Re: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)
« Reply #23 on: August 02, 2018, 11:14:09 am »
Academy means business if you dare to steal the voodoo-waifus.

Rushing voodoo asap only works to a degree and the big payoff aims for witches, sorceress or fairies.
All of those are expensive and locked behind tech and codexes that cuts down options and is simply not a longterm solution.

Voodoo is 'extra' and more of a supportive function. A chainmail/fullplate can work only in temperate enviroment without restrictions. Mobility loss and small inventory. No piercing protection.
The armor values are also not the greatest since those armors are designed to dodge-tank/block enemy melee-attacks and not bullets.

Modern/Advanced Personal Protection and Advanced Firearms/Smart-guns do so much more for the crew.
Access to the blue armors and weapons that help you aim (and have decent ammo-clips + leightweight) carries the campaign better and is more likely to unlock.

Offline Eddie

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Re: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)
« Reply #24 on: August 02, 2018, 03:17:45 pm »
The problem with a no firearms playthrough is that you are not training firing skills, which hurts your air damage output.

My path to get air fighting capabilities:
Get an airspeeder with seagull and shoot megapol craft. These have 25mm cannons and ammo. The police flights need "Contact: Car Thieves" researched to spawn. Once you have a 25mm cannon you can get an aircar and go hunt civies.
Next step is Lokk'Naar and Shark Jetbike. Once you get over 100 reaction on the Lokk'Naar the Jetbike with 25mm cannon can take down anything that is not armored. The Jetbike with a 100 reaction regular gal is still pretty durable.
Once you have the Jetbike with Lokk'Naar your problems shift from surviving to damage output. From hunting low tier craft you get 50mm cannons and gauss cannons. These allow you to go after armored targets. The airspeeder with seagulls is again useful here, now as secondary interceptor.

I haven't gotten real interceptors yet. Let's see what tech is needed to replace the Jetbike as the mainstay of my air power. Probably Predator with thrusters is required to retire the Jetbikes.

Which impact the codex weapons have depends on when you get them in relation to other air tech.
- The conversion launcher is limited by it's total damage. You will have it on an airspeeder. Add a second airspeeder with a regular seagull and you have about Jetbike level of air power, at a higher price with less flexibility (seagull is unsuitable for civies). I think Zaxx token missions spawn regularly enough that the Jetbike will be about 3-5 month lather than your conversion launcher. If you are willing to reload an air combat and have skilled pilots, two airspeeders with regular seagulls can with some exceptions do about the same job.
- The charger laser needs an aircar. The tech to get the aircar will also spawn the megapol flights which will give you 25mm cannons. Depending on RNG, you will get 25mm cannons about 1-3 month after you could have put your charger laser on an aircar. Thats just a few missed civies, not such a big deal. Scavanged ammo is enough to keep your 25mm cannon loaded.
- Little Ilya needs ammo to work. You will likely unlock that after you get Jetbikes. Then you will use it on a secondary interceptor as damage dealer vs armored Ufos. Does the same thing as seagulls, but cheaper.
- Flame cannon and Hawk are comparable to the conversion launcher regarding interception capabilities (if you have a skilled pilot). The damage output is about the same, and the Hawk can tank a bit (depending on pilot evasion). The Hawk is a bit faster than an airspeeder so it's easier to catch things. Ammo is cheaper. Downside is, you will take damage while fighting and then have downtime because of repair.

Bottom line, the codex weapons don't change things that much. And yeah, the Red Codex gets the least help in air combat.
« Last Edit: August 02, 2018, 03:21:58 pm by Eddie »

Offline ivandogovich

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Re: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)
« Reply #25 on: August 02, 2018, 03:53:55 pm »
Great Thread Legionof1!  :)

I loved the challenge you set and your write up!  Great explanations of the Tech Gate problems.

Cheers!

Offline legionof1

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Re: A new experaince(Campaign reports and museings)
« Reply #26 on: August 02, 2018, 06:47:07 pm »
snip
Rushing voodoo asap only works to a degree and the big payoff aims for witches, sorceress or fairies.
All of those are expensive and locked behind tech and codexes that cuts down options and is simply not a longterm solution.

Voodoo is 'extra' and more of a supportive function. A chainmail/fullplate can work only in temperate enviroment without restrictions. Mobility loss and small inventory. No piercing protection.
The armor values are also not the greatest since those armors are designed to dodge-tank/block enemy melee-attacks and not bullets.
snip

Yeah it not the outfits eventually garnered, Voodoo also gates Diplomacy which gates interrogations and school graduation, both are required to complete the game. Chain as follows: Voodoo>Contacts Thebes>Diplomacy>Graduation, Interrogation. Also gates buying captives, and stopping pogroms and sway government and reticulan coop.