The OpenXcom Files: Tips and Tricks!

[Juku121]

But as far as I can tell, they aren't. Instant grenades are the best thing ever for not getting spotted, while launchers behave like guns with direct hits and like grenades with misses that still do damage via explosions.

My testing did feature arcing grenade launchers with HE, and they behaved pretty much like the Light Cannon HE did for zombieguy223. Didn't try incendiaries, but I don't see why they should be different.

I think instant grenades probably weren't considered at all when all this was designed.


Edit: Tried some more tests. It's actually quite strange. Pure fire (no direct damage, only fire special rules), smoke and stun grenades don't register even on a direct hit. Napalm (+direct damage) does get you both seen and spotted, but does neither on an indirect hit. Launcher napalm is the same. Gas grenades (smoke but does damage) behave like regular grenades.

Edit2: Tried instant grenades again, and this time they got me seen but not spotted for snipers, for both direct and indirect hits. Gah, I give up!

[Stone Lake]

Yes, indirect AOE doesn't activate "spotted" state for sniper-spotter mechanic. However, killing any unit makes attacker being "seen" by regular AI mechanics. Whatever in-game behaviour that amounts to, I don't know, since I don't know how exactly regular AI works. In practice, it seems to rarely target unseen targets, but still does it.

[Juku121]

However, killing any unit makes attacker being "seen" by regular AI mechanics.

Doesn't seem to be true for incendiaries, smokes and stun. And not even for indirect fire-damage-on-hit kills.

Would be nice if someone confirmed this, since my results didn't seem to always be consistent.

Whatever in-game behaviour that amounts to, I don't know, since I don't know how exactly regular AI works. In practice, it seems to rarely target unseen targets, but still does it.

I've not seen AI shoot an 'unseen' target without sniping, for one. You occasionally get grenades or other explosives meant for someone else.

Otherwise, it stops its patrol routes and kinda moves towards the 'seen' units, but not in a deterministic or straightforward manner. And psi attacks you if it can.

[Stone Lake]

Doesn't seem to be true for incendiaries, smokes and stun. And not even for indirect fire-damage-on-hit kills.

Not sure how are you checking. I'm alluding to this line. It definitely triggers both on gas and grenade kills.

I've not seen AI shoot an 'unseen' target without sniping, for one. You occasionally get grenades or other explosives meant for someone else.

Otherwise, it stops its patrol routes and kinda moves towards the 'seen' units, but not in a deterministic or straightforward manner. And psi attacks you if it can.

What, you never got blastered from the dark? But yeah, that's why I'm saying - *rarely*. This behaviour can be mostly, but not completely disregarded. Didn't see some of that myself either, but some experienced players accounted that they got grenaded from beyond visible range without sniper/spotter active.

[Juku121]

Not sure how are you checking.

By saving, throwing the 'nade, saving again and comparing the saves. Try it yourself.

I'm alluding to this line. It definitely triggers both on gas and grenade kills.

This awards kills. We were talking about detection on hit more than kill.

In any case, that line does not trigger on anything that doesn't reduce health, like smoke or stun. Not sure what's up with napalm, maybe burning to death doesn't count, either. Or possibly there's contaminion because that's the first hit of the battle, so there's no-one to assign 'blame' for the kill to.

I guess it makes you technically right in that actual kills get you noticed (unless the blame is hard to assign for some reason), but something is up with fire and stuns aren't kills for this purpose.

...some experienced players accounted that they got grenaded from beyond visible range without sniper/spotter active.

Was this XCF, vanilla OXCE or some other mod?

Anyway, players - even experienced players - have told various kinds of tall tales over the years. Their truthfulness varies, even if the teller is sincere.

[Stone Lake]

I guess it makes you technically right in that actual kills get you noticed

Yes, by regular AI visibility. It's used in regular AI behavour. Sniper-spotter visibility is different. It has only 2 triggers - when spotter sees you directly, and on direct projectile hits, including, say, rockets, but not not their AOE. And not end-of-turn activated grenades. When player character is snipper-spotter visible, units with "sniper" value defined in the ruleset have chance (equal to the value) to attack the character. That's basically all you need to know.

Spoiler offtopic:

We were talking about detection on hit more than kill.

Who are "we"? "Are these people in the room with us"?
I wrote specifically about kills and then you jump out with "nuh-uh" to me, and I'm replying to you.

[Juku121]

Who are "we"? "Are these people in the room with us"?

Me, psavola, zombieguy223, at least. And, yes, they're in the same thread as us.

I wrote specifically about kills and then you jump out with "nuh-uh" to me, and I'm replying to you.

You wrote about kills in a thread discussion about spotting in general, and now want to hide behind 'but technically I'm right!" What matters in for gameplay strategy (what this thread is about) is whether your agents get spotted, not whether they actually killed someone in the process of getting spotted. Killing is up to the RNG gods, throwing and shooting (including the target) is up to the player.

It has only 2 triggers - when spotter sees you directly, and on direct projectile hits, including, say, rockets, but not not their AOE. And not end-of-turn activated grenades.

Well, I suppose sometimes the grenade hits the enemy and gets you spotted, then. The grenades generally didn't get me spotted, even on a direct hit, but sometimes did after end-of-turn, and at one time even for throwing.

So, in practice, controlling whether you do 'projectile hits' or whether someone spots you because of special vision rules like Sectoid psi-vision or corner cases, and whether the death is counted or not due to burning or stun damage or whatever (or the 'blame' game with explosions and assigning kills to the likeliest culprit.) is more complicated than "That's basically all you need to know."

[Stone Lake]

What matters in for gameplay strategy (what this thread is about) is whether your agents get spotted, not whether they actually killed someone in the process of getting spotted.

It matters whether sitting in smoke chucking grenades is completely foolproof strategy. It's not, even when executed perfectly, due to said kills affecting visibility. But it's still darn effective strategy.

Well, I suppose sometimes the grenade hits the enemy and gets you spotted, then.

This never happens. There's no such thing as "direct grenade hit" (i.e. it doesn't hit unit, explode and deal damage), unless that's grenade from a launcher - i.e. effectively a rocket.

Is more complicated

It's really not unless you're making it out to be. Corner cases don't affect main strategy being "Not in 6-sided cover? Guess I'll die."

Spoiler offtopic:

You wrote about kills in a thread discussion about spotting in general, and now want to hide behind 'but technically I'm right!"

No. You failed to properly read 2 sentences that I wrote about thing X and now hiding behind "b-but were talking about thing Y".

[Juku121]

It matters whether sitting in smoke chucking grenades is completely foolproof strategy. It's not, even when executed perfectly, due to said kills affecting visibility.

Or whether the enemy is inside a building you can't throw grenades into, or you're in some caves where throwing is severely limited, or there are some Sectopods around negating most of your smoke's effectiveness, or...

Or it actually works because your grenade was a stun grenade and thus not a kill. Or an incendiary and the kill got attributed to 'burning' and thus you may get spotted a turn later when the victim dies, or never if someone else shot the burning fella in the meantime.


In any case, 'seen' visibility hasn't been the problem here, so while valid, this is not a particularly topical criticism of the "smoke&nade" strategy.

This never happens. There's no such thing as "direct grenade hit"...

In that case I don't know how I got some incendiary kills to get me spotted for snipers. Maybe I was not quite as isolated from sight as I thought, maybe I misread the files, maybe some other issue. And if I don't get it in a somewhat controlled experiment, an actual mission is going to be a lot harder to decipher.

It's really not unless you're making it out to be.

So, can you predict with at least 95% accuracy whether a grenade toss will get you spotted, seen, both or neither; in one turn or several? The only consistent thing seems to be that you won't get sniper-spotted by the victim unless something else is going on, and will get snipered if you shoot and hit a spotter.

Spoiler:

You failed to properly read 2 sentences that I wrote about thing X and now hiding behind "b-but were talking about thing Y".

Ah, the classic "No, U!" defense.

[psavola]

Just yesterday I played Red Dawn HQ and Dagon Forward Base with a tactic that (up to a certain point), I positioned about 8-10 agents separately in a good cover at the edge of the map close by and made damn sure they didn't try to shoot anyone and no one saw them. I even had to do Red Dawn HQ during day because it was located in the North Pole during a summer time, so no cover of darkness would be available. They just kept throwing regular and incendiary grenades for about 5-15 turns. I didn't notice a single time that the enemies would have tried to target them. The enemies did try to target my spotters - a few units, e.g. dogs, which went out to spot the enemy and fled back up the ramp of the Osprey or somewhere else (where someone usually tried to shoot them and eventually mostly killed them). Some of this might of course have been luck, but mostly reflects to to the most recent results here.

There are some cases in which the protection of smoke is inadequate. Juku already mentioned some, for example, enemies with heat vision. Another one might be that the explosion height is forced to 2 (instead of round shape at 3). In many missions there are buildings at least 3 levels high. I think in some cases (e.g. a building is close enough) enemies could see your guys over the smoke. I have certainly seen the partial ineffectiveness of smoke agaist flying enemies with forced explosion height with TWoTS as well as in TFTD city terror missions the enemies up in the level 4 usually killing the aquanauts regardless of smoke (until you set the height to 3). I doubt this affected Juku's tests, but could be one factor among many where the results could be unreliable.

[Stone Lake]

There are some cases in which the protection of smoke is inadequate. Juku already mentioned some, for example, enemies with heat vision.

Smoke still works most of the time, as heat vision is not end-all for smoke tactics.
Dog-level heat vision is not particularly effective, is it? And that's what most enemies with heat vision have. Whereas you can roll with rats, scout drones, or even bats. Sectopods completely disregard smoke, but their posse usually don't.
Psi-sense isn't end-all either. Sectoids are easily fooled with smoke. Ethereals - not so much (works over really long, 20+ tiles, distances).

The real kryptonite to `smoke + distance` defence are AOE attacks. 50% accuracy debuff is not enough to protect you against EXALT grenadiers.

In many missions there are buildings at least 3 levels high. I think in some cases (e.g. a building is close enough) enemies could see your guys over the smoke.

I tested with debug mode how far away RD pioneer sees my armored vest guy in mortar shell smoke, after it diffused for a couple turns, at daytime.
On ground (height 0), he's seen from 4 tiles away from East: XxxxxR
At height 1 : same, 4 tiles. At height 2: 6 tiles. H3 : 6, H4: 8, H5: 9, H6: 10 ... H10: ~14.
So yes, height allows to see units a bit farther through smoke. But it depends how exactly did the smoke diffuse - in some cases, like close to walls, I wasn't able to get viewing distance less than 8 tiles at H10, compared to 14 of previous example. And in some cases viewing target from the north instead of east/etc., adds/subtracts 1-2 tiles of visibility.
I didn't test the reverse visibility though - will the x-com guy on the ground see floating enemy farther away?

In practice, however, manor attacks were the only case for me when it felt like building height was the issue - I wasn't ever able to "safely" sit in smoke there, always being swarmed with enemies. Floaters did surprise me a couple of times, but were quickly dealt with. Something like 3-tile high lab ships were never a problem.

Spoiler offtopic:

Or an incendiary and the kill got attributed to 'burning' and thus you may get spotted a turn later when the victim dies, or never if someone else shot the burning fella in the meantime.

Incendiary has 3 damage components to it - basic explosion, fire status effect, and terrain damage, so I guess terrain kill attribution can happen. However, when I can't afford risks, to be on safe side, I would always just assume that it was my guy who it was attributed to. Same with all your so-called 'deciphering'. That's why it's quite simple matter.

In any case, 'seen' visibility hasn't been the problem here, so while valid, this is not a particularly topical criticism of the "smoke&nade" strategy.

And if I don't get it in a somewhat controlled experiment, an actual mission is going to be a lot harder to decipher.

...Shoulda tried actual mission?

In that case I don't know how I got some incendiary kills to get me spotted for snipers. Maybe I was not quite as isolated from sight as I thought, maybe I misread the files, maybe some other issue.

One of these, yes.

[Vakrug]

They just kept throwing regular and incendiary grenades for about 5-15 turns.

Yes, this is exactly what happens all the time when I use smoke. When an enemy unit don't have a line of sight to shoot, it throws explosives which are mush more dangerous.

This mechanics is one of the most annoying things is game. Mostly because it is impossible to figure it out just by playing a game. You are lucky if you have read about this mechanics somewhere, otherwise the only conclusion can be made is that stealth is not working. Which is very sad thing if you consider how much stealth stuff is in many mods.

[Juku121]

Smoke still works most of the time, as heat vision is not end-all for smoke tactics.

The problem with low-level heat vision is not that it renders smoke useless, it's that it throws off any smoke calculations you might have become accustomed to while fighting against enemies without HV. So you'll be making more mistakes and you're going to need more smoke, and more smoke means an opportunity cost because throwing/launching smoke is not free.

Sectoids are easily fooled with smoke. Ethereals - not so much (works over really long, 20+ tiles, distances).

Sectoid leadership got a boost recently, to exactly 20 tiles. And the danger with Sectoids is that it is far easier to miscalculate, especially when there are walls and buildings nearby. 20 tiles is not an inconsiderable distance, it can easily be on the other side of the hill or something.


Anyway, yes, smoke still works against heat vision. But it works less well, and isn't the kind of foolproof tactic it used to be.

The real kryptonite to `smoke + distance` defence are AOE attacks. 50% accuracy debuff is not enough to protect you against EXALT grenadiers.

That, and snipers in general. If they shoot you 50 times, it doesn't matter that their chance to hit is 2 not-percent. That's what resurrected this whole discussion in the first place.

Spoiler "extra":

I would always just assume that it was my guy who it was attributed to. Same with all your so-called 'deciphering'. That's why it's quite simple matter.

Anything looks simple after oversimplifying.

Shoulda tried actual mission?

What for?

[psavola]

Yes, this is exactly what happens all the time when I use smoke. When an enemy unit don't have a line of sight to shoot, it throws explosives which are mush more dangerous.

This mechanics is one of the most annoying things is game. Mostly because it is impossible to figure it out just by playing a game. You are lucky if you have read about this mechanics somewhere, otherwise the only conclusion can be made is that stealth is not working. Which is very sad thing if you consider how much stealth stuff is in many mods.

You misunderstood, I should have been clearer, I meant exactly the opposite. By "they" in this context I was referring to my agents. Those that just kept throwing grenades and deliberately not shooting anyone were not attacked at all, while in vanilla game and other mods I would have used those agents to shoot enemies with snipers (which results in gunfire and grenades back at you). There have been some instances of grenades thrown at me, but in those I have already been spotted or seen. And indeed, this (and the related thing: enemy grenade launchers) is what I'm the most afraid of when playing ironman.

[psavola]

I had Osiron Hacienda mission. All the Osiron guys are snipers but none of them are spotters. So their sniping skills and advanced weapons availed them naught. In a similar fashion, I did a Lotus Forward Base. A tricky spawn location where the Osprey ramp is next to the opening and you already see 10 enemies without moving, but darkness, smoke and running out with most of the crew to a safer spot helped a lot. I've adopted a practice to verify on most missions I'm not already familiar with (from ruleset or http://xcf.trigramreactor.net) which enemies I'm going to face and which are spotters, which are snipers and which are both. In this mission you could shoot Warriors and Assassins, otherwise it'd be normal and incendiary grenades. Forward guys only got shot a couple of times and had one enemy failed attempt at throwing a grenade at me.

Now, another topic that might be relevant to this thread. Any more general strategies on which base facilities are most essential and in which bases?

I guess I could start with a tip that someone has mentioned in passing elsewhere I think. Currently (Jun 1998) I have four bases which provide roughly world-wide coverage so that I can fly-transfer Osprey there and do essentially any kind of mission from that other base and then transfer back. This strategy seems  superior (by reducing the salary and other expenses as well as micromanagement) to trying to build independent strong agent teams in each base (I do have some 5 or so agents and smaller transports on most other bases though). You'll just need enough storage space (roughly 100, allow for a decent weapons stockpile on Osprey) on each base. [By the way, it would be nice if OXCE provided a way to check how much storage a craft with all the equipment requires, I couldn't find a way to do it.]

There seem to be so many base facilities - and more coming up - that I doubt a typical strategy of main base being able to almost everything well would work, as I anticipate running out of space with three hangars. Now I'm wondering if I should focus on building for example Science Labs in 3rd and 4th bases (those don't even have intel/bio labs yet, but science lab is more cost-efficient) and ramp up the research even more (currently at 75 scientists) or whether I should build another workshop. If the workshop (still only 20 engineers but the space will be an issue shortly), how much manufacturing capacity will actually fit in the main base or should these be built elsewhere. It appears this mod is (after early game) manufacturing heavy and manufacturing takes a huge amount of time and resources, so to be able to manufacture anything in a sensible time you'll need at least two workshops. I suspect I'll need at least two workshops in the main base because otherwise constantly transferring components and manufactured items would likely drive anyone except a micromanagement geek insane.

And another general question would be what facilities could be skipped in the main and other bases. I'm considering that, if necessary, the prison(s) and animal pens (and thinking back, maybe also alien containment) could reside only on a secondary base and you could rely on post-mission Transfer to keep live captures, but this requires that you ensure there's always free capacity at the target base (though unsure if post-mission transfer would work if the aliens attacked the base). Already did that with ghost tank and skipped rat farm completely.