Author Topic: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod  (Read 32246 times)

Offline Buscher

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #75 on: February 28, 2021, 11:08:47 am »
fraking kidding me? 50+ hits with heavy plasma didnt kill it


That seems to be intentional. You should be using (heavy) lasers instead. That's why I brought them together with high explosives to Cydonia.

Spoiler:
Sectpod

Armor
70 Front
60 Sides
50 Rear
50 Under

DamageModifiers
  80% Plasma
150% Laser
  60% Explosive

Weapons
Heavy Plasma 64 flat => 80% * 64 = 51
Heavy Laser 52 flat => 150% * 52 = 78
High Explosive 200 flat => 60% * 200 = 120

Offline WaldoTheRanger

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #76 on: March 01, 2021, 06:18:40 am »
Because blind firing was hardly possible (40% no-sight penalty multiplier) the sniper-esque weapons were further devalued.

I've never liked how intense modders generally make the no sight penalty.
Your average map in this game (aside from terror missions and large craft + etc) are so small that the soldier would have to have impaired vision to not be able to see across the whole thing.

It makes sense that they'd have to get closer to spot an enemy, as they're likely trying to use cover/hide from you.
But once your scout calls the position out, they're like <70 ft away. There's no way you can't see them.

And it just shouldn't be a thing for sniper rifles cause they have scopes.

If the map is big enough, I'm fine with aim penalties applying when you get to like 30 tiles away or something, but that's plenty in my opinion.

Offline Dogbarian

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #77 on: March 01, 2021, 10:52:29 pm »
I agree with having a "no-sight" penalty, but 40% is excessive.  75% is sufficient, and covers things like smoke obscuring the LoS or so forth, keeping you from a clean shot.  You can even set max aim range on more weapons if you really didn't like long range fire.

Offline Nirran

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #78 on: March 04, 2021, 02:06:48 am »
That seems to be intentional. You should be using (heavy) lasers instead. That's why I brought them together with high explosives to Cydonia.

Spoiler:
Sectpod

Armor
70 Front
60 Sides
50 Rear
50 Under

DamageModifiers
  80% Plasma
150% Laser
  60% Explosive

Weapons
Heavy Plasma 64 flat => 80% * 64 = 51
Heavy Laser 52 flat => 150% * 52 = 78
High Explosive 200 flat => 60% * 200 = 120


thnx,confirmed during play :)

Offline cevaralien

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #79 on: March 25, 2021, 03:56:07 am »
Thanks for creating the mod. The different take on the balance is something I enjoyed a lot. I'd like to share my views on some choices of the mod. For reference I have played on Veteran and finished on 14.02.00.


## Weapon Balance

The flat damage approach is interesting. The script for wounds depending on the hitzone is also there but I have never looked at it in such great detail that I understood that. It would be great if there was a Ufopaedia page describing how wounds work. The 0-200% and 50-150% range is easy to grasp in comparison. The flat damage is also interesting because there are more chances to wound instead of outright kill, so in general it's a different experience. And the wound script spices it up a bit. There are some outliers such as the small launcher ammo which apparently still use the 50-150% damage range.

On the other hand the flat damage favors autoguns making the machine gun one of the best weapons. Single shot do not have the raw damage to destroy sturdier enemies allowing them to reaction shoot. So I avoided single shot weapons for the most part. I wasn't impressed with the Heavy Plasma and Heavy Laser at all. Because blind firing was hardly possible (40% no-sight penalty multiplier) the sniper-esque weapons were further devalued. But it makes the game a bit more fair to the AI because you can't shoot well from all over the map.

The weapon progression was a bit strange. Plasma was super easy to research because alien soldiers are quite easy to come by in large scouts and opportunistic targets around the player craft. So my progression was Standard -> Plasma -> Alloy Ammo -> Laser. In the end I mainly used rifles and machine guns with alloy ammo as well as plasma rifles. The shotgun was useful in the beginning because of the high accuracy. I hardly used the grenade launcher because blind firing wasn't really possible. It was better to use hand grenades. Also I haven't touched the pistol, laser pistol, laser rifle and rocket launcher. I bailed on Sectoid terror missions while I didn't have plasma/alloy ammo. The fire extinguisher wasn't needed either.

Also I liked the minimalism approach. Additionally the snap shot of rifles actually being auto shot is what I liked a lot. The design for the laser weapons that their batteries cannot be changed is a very interesting design choice but I only used Heavy Lasers in Cydonia and haven't managed to unload all shots. I wasn't happy with batteries only being obtainable when manufacturing the laser weapon. Laser batteries should be an extra manufacture project in my opinion.

In terms of armors I haven't used Space suit. The built-in motion scanner is nice and I only used the mind probe in a base assault to knock a Floater Commander out. So I haven't used the built-in mind probe except for PSI resistance. My Cydonia armor mix were power suits (8 ) and flying suits (6) with either PSI or motion detector modules.

And I want to mention that I haven't seen a single Sectopod and I didn't use any HWPs because the transport crafts are too small for wasting space on HWPs.


## Stats/Training

I am bit torn on that all soldiers start with very similar stats except for bravery and psi strength. It gives the feeling that all soldiers are professionals but also that they are quite the clones. As such I only cared for bravery and psi strength. Additionally I preferred whoever got to training first. Snipers took the longest. In the end I had 3 Psi, 4 Snipers, 12 Scouts, 15 Commandos. Trained troops should still increase Psionic skill since it helps with psi defense. Mind control/panic is something I haven't used so I can't say such much about that.

Wounds reducing stats is interesting. On one hand it would be great if they also reduce the max stats. But on the other hand X-Com is very likely to have the best surgeons.


## UFOs/Alien Missions

I haven't seen any Abductors and Battleships. The aliens were mainly running harvesting missions so I have seen plenty of Harvesters. The alien missions having less waves and also having an escort for the final wave really helped with the tedium and was more fun in general. The alien fighters/hunter-killers are interesting but show the clunky UI of the game. I haven't engaged any early escorted craft because the risk of losing the interceptors with basic weaponry was high. I haven't intercepted many crafts in general except for the last few months. Landing with the Skyranger was nearly always possible for scouts. Once I understood that when engaging hunter-killers the attacked-interceptor can use evasive maneuvers (half hit chance vs interceptor, half firing rate for interceptor) I set my interceptor missions in pairs and let the second one shoot at full firing rate. Once I had Stingrays AFM (with laser cannon) the results were pretty much in my favor. That the Stingrays have a better accuracy than Avalanches makes them the go-to dogfighting missiles. The Avalanches AFM were mainly used to prevent terror missions by shooting down the craft. The ammo for the plasma cannon was being sold, so I haven't used it. I haven't felt the need either. But it might have been the more economic choice as a whole bunch of Avalanches AFM/Stingrays AFM are very expensive. But I liked that they are expensive.

What was really lacking is something in-between interceptor and Firestorm. Especially considering the short range of interceptors. The Firestorm is a competent interceptor and I was swimming in E115 so fuel is no issue. But it took ages to research it. I haven't built the Lightning and the Avenger was only used for Cydonia. So it was interceptors and the Skyranger for most of the game. For the most part of the game I was running up to 6 interceptors in pairs which I moved from region to region depending on the UFO activity.

Sidenote: Because I got no Abductors and the only base I attacked didn't include an examination room, I ended up editing my savegame to add one into my inventory so I can finish the game.


## Facilities

Plasma Defense was not researchable but going by the lore it seems to be intentional. I have never used base defense facilities and I didn't even have one base defense mission. Laboratories and Workshops only having a capacity of 10 is interesting. I had 90 scientists and 40 engineers at the end. The lower number of employees helped with maintenance. Avenger took a bit more than a month to build and then I went to Cydonia.


## Other things

Civilians being capable of defending themselves was great. Aliens using Sniper/Spotter is annoying but kept me on my toes. I sometimes wondered how they have even seen me and hit so well with the few shots they fired. Night-vision 10 for aliens favors night missions because the player can manipulate the lighting with flares. Commandos having a greater night vision is something I have hardly used. Ethereals not using weapons makes them more special and feel more mysterious.


## Conclusion

In general it felt a lot like vanilla but also different. The minimalism approach together with the modified rifles work well together with the slightly smaller Skyranger. Autoguns were more useful than most. The weapon progression was backwards. Soldiers are a bit samey but differ afterwards by special training. The flat damage approach should be explained in an Ufopaedia article. Definitely liked the approach for the air game. And Many other interesting ideas that add to the game. Overall a fun vanilla experience. Thanks again for creating the mod.

Hi, thanks for the feedback.

The purpose of the laser battery is to do a weapon that is consumable on mission and rechargable between them. The problem is that a weapon that doesn't use clips dissapear after the last shot, so, i do a "fake" clip to allows a consumable weapon rechargable after missons.

Nice observation; i will do a ufopedia article explaining the wounds mechanics.

Notice that the personal weapons are designed to be usefull at all stages of the game, there is no obsoletable weapons. The fireguns could be upgraded with alloy bullets, the lasers are mid power weapons that doesn't requires clips but they have limited shots. Plasma are powerfull, but not so accurate and expensive in clips.

And you are rigth, there is not mid interceptor. I was not sure how to board this problem, because i think that is not very "realistic" to design a new figther and another one just behind (firestorm). I decided to do the logical movement in a "real" world: update the weapons. That is the reason for the Avalanche AFM and Stingray AFM.

Offline cevaralien

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #80 on: March 25, 2021, 03:58:20 am »
That seems to be intentional. You should be using (heavy) lasers instead. That's why I brought them together with high explosives to Cydonia.

Spoiler:
Sectpod

Armor
70 Front
60 Sides
50 Rear
50 Under

DamageModifiers
  80% Plasma
150% Laser
  60% Explosive

Weapons
Heavy Plasma 64 flat => 80% * 64 = 51
Heavy Laser 52 flat => 150% * 52 = 78
High Explosive 200 flat => 60% * 200 = 120

The Sectopod is a real nightmare in my mod. There is many approach to confront them, but, there is a "easy" way to defeat them. Look at the human weapons, there is a special ammo for these situations  :)

Offline cevaralien

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #81 on: March 25, 2021, 04:04:47 am »
I agree with having a "no-sight" penalty, but 40% is excessive.  75% is sufficient, and covers things like smoke obscuring the LoS or so forth, keeping you from a clean shot.  You can even set max aim range on more weapons if you really didn't like long range fire.

This penalty have the purpose of balance the sniper/spotter feature. When i used for the first time sniper/spotter was almost impossible to survive, even on smoke. The best solution that i found was to lower the nlos penalty but i compensate it with sniper trainings and lowering the aimed shot TUs of many weapons, making possible to do long shots but aiming, not simply doing snap shots.

Offline Buscher

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #82 on: March 25, 2021, 08:17:07 am »

The purpose of the laser battery is to do a weapon that is consumable on mission and rechargable between them. The problem is that a weapon that doesn't use clips dissapear after the last shot, so, i do a "fake" clip to allows a consumable weapon rechargable after missons.


Oh wow. I am stuck so much in thinking how the normal mechanics work that I had thought that the battery would be spent after battle. Then looking at the manufacture project I was expecting that I had to sell the "spent" laser weapon and build a new one.
Every laser related article does have the word "rechargeable" but it reads more like fluff than an actual game mechanic. That recoveryTransformations you do, which is really an amazing idea, I did not expect at all. I kept looking at the Stats for Nerds page and trying to grasp why you would have a laser weapon that is being spent on use. Maybe you could write this information in a new paragraph on the respective ufopaedia articles, so it is much more present to the eye.

Also if you want you can add another little script to show a related entry in the Stats for Nerds:
Spoiler:
items:
  - type: STR_LASER_PISTOL_CLIP
    tags:
      ITEM_RECHARGEABLE: 1

  - type: STR_LASER_RIFLE_CLIP
    tags:
      ITEM_RECHARGEABLE: 1

  - type: STR_HEAVY_LASER_CLIP
    tags:
      ITEM_RECHARGEABLE: 1


extended:
  tags:
    RuleItem:
      ITEM_RECHARGEABLE: int


  scripts:
    statsForNerdsItem:
      - offset: 22
        code: |
          var int temp;

          rule.getTag temp Tag.ITEM_RECHARGEABLE;
          if gt temp 0;
            stats_state.addTextRow "Battery reclaimed and recharged after battle" "True";
          end;
          return;

Offline cevaralien

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #83 on: March 25, 2021, 03:34:09 pm »
Oh wow. I am stuck so much in thinking how the normal mechanics work that I had thought that the battery would be spent after battle. Then looking at the manufacture project I was expecting that I had to sell the "spent" laser weapon and build a new one.
Every laser related article does have the word "rechargeable" but it reads more like fluff than an actual game mechanic. That recoveryTransformations you do, which is really an amazing idea, I did not expect at all. I kept looking at the Stats for Nerds page and trying to grasp why you would have a laser weapon that is being spent on use. Maybe you could write this information in a new paragraph on the respective ufopaedia articles, so it is much more present to the eye.

Also if you want you can add another little script to show a related entry in the Stats for Nerds:
Spoiler:
items:
  - type: STR_LASER_PISTOL_CLIP
    tags:
      ITEM_RECHARGEABLE: 1

  - type: STR_LASER_RIFLE_CLIP
    tags:
      ITEM_RECHARGEABLE: 1

  - type: STR_HEAVY_LASER_CLIP
    tags:
      ITEM_RECHARGEABLE: 1


extended:
  tags:
    RuleItem:
      ITEM_RECHARGEABLE: int


  scripts:
    statsForNerdsItem:
      - offset: 22
        code: |
          var int temp;

          rule.getTag temp Tag.ITEM_RECHARGEABLE;
          if gt temp 0;
            stats_state.addTextRow "Battery reclaimed and recharged after battle" "True";
          end;
          return;

I understand. Ok, i can add a more detailed description for these weapons. I will use your idea of the description on "nerd stats".

Offline cevaralien

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #84 on: December 28, 2021, 02:06:45 am »
Hi.

I have released a new version of this mod. It is only an update to use OXCE 7.2, but i expect to do other minor changes to the UFOPEDIA.

Offline efrenespartano

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #85 on: December 28, 2021, 02:27:01 am »
Congrats on the new update! :D

Offline cevaralien

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #86 on: March 27, 2022, 05:41:35 am »
Hi.

I have released a new version of XCOM Multimod. This is a major rebalance taking in mind previous feedback and some changes that i think could help to improve the gaming.

What is new?

Snap shots improved for all weapons.
Decreased snap and auto range to 5, so, now dropoff begin from 5 tiles.
Rifle Grenade launch accuracy improved. Now it`s dropoff begins from 20 tiles.
Increased max distance view to 30
Increased map sizes by 10 tiles.
Celatid weapon accuracy decreased.
Improved some stats for soldiers.
Blaster Launcher damage reduced to 110 and it only have 4 waypoints now.
Rebalanced Ethereal melee and health stats. Now they are physicaly more weak.
Rebalanced Rifle/Grenade to use throwing as primary stat for accuracy.
Rebalanced Rifle/Shotgun to use melee as primary stat for accuracy.
All pistols uses melee as primary stat for accuracy.
Blaster Launcher use psi strength as primary stat for accuracy.
Renamed special trainings: Sniper (Shooter), Scout (Stalker). Commando still been the same.
Rebalanced special trainings (Commando, Stalker and Shooter). Now the vision at nigth is a bonus to stalkers, not commando soldiers.
Improved wound script. A hit in the head that cause a fatal wound but without kill, will cause the unit to fall unconscious. This not apply for robotics.
Heavy Plasma, Heavy Laser and Rocket Launcher uses strength stat as a plus for accuracy.
All fireguns, lasers and plasma weapons now have a ToStun damage bonus.
Implemented stat string to identify specialist unit.
Fixed bug that doesn't allow to rise stats of special trained soldiers.
Rebalanced base defenses accuracy and power.
Rebalanced Ethereal blast to reduce effects on morale.
nLOSaccuracy increased to 70.
Now medikits and first aid kits don't heal aliens.

I hope you like it.

Offline Buscher

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #87 on: March 28, 2022, 06:10:42 pm »
Wow, I just downloaded 1.08 like two days ago. What a coincidence.

Btw I have figured out, why your soldiers in New Battle got those weird stats.

If you have a look at the battle.cfg you will realize that all the different soldier types are being spawned

Spoiler:
Code: [Select]
$ cat user/xcom1/battle.cfg | grep SOLDIER
    - type: STR_SOLDIER
    - type: STR_SOLDIER
    - type: STR_SOLDIER
    - type: STR_SOLDIER
    - type: STR_SOLDIER
    - type: STR_BASE_SOLDIER
    - type: STR_BASE_SOLDIER
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_SNIPER
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_SNIPER
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_SNIPER
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_SNIPER
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_SNIPER
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_COMMANDO
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_COMMANDO
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_COMMANDO
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_COMMANDO
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_COMMANDO
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_COMMANDO
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_COMMANDO
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_COMMANDO
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_SCOUT
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_SCOUT
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_SCOUT
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_SCOUT
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_SCOUT
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_PSI
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_PSI
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_PSI
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_PSI
    - type: STR_SOLDIER_PSI

When looking in your xm-soldiers.rul minStats and maxStats are only defined for STR_SOLDIER but not for the rest. In the campaign it doesn't matter as you transform from STR_SOLDIER to STR_SOLDIER_SNIPER etc.

Also you should run OpenXcom Ruleset Tools and OpenXcom Ruleset Linker. You have some errors in your rul files including using 'aimedRange' instead of 'aimRange'.

Another idea is to rename Throwing, Firing and Melee Accuracy to reflect your changes. Melee Accuracy could be 'Swiftness' and Throwing could be 'Trajectory Accuracy'. There are very likely better names.
And there are still weapons that don't use the flat damage modifier. But maybe it's in your design that you want the ammo for the Small Launcher to keep the 50-150% range.

Offline cevaralien

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Re: [OXCE] XCOM Multimod
« Reply #88 on: March 29, 2022, 05:39:41 pm »
Yes i was trying to fix the problem of the weird stats on single battles, but i was not able to found the problem. I think that i need to declare all stats for all soldier classes.

I like your idea of rename the stats. Thanks.

Wow! I didn't saw the damage error of the small launcher! Thanks for point it out.