Aldazar

My opinion is that, as others have pointed out, you don't ever see a general out in the field, probably not a colnel or even a major... A captain is probably as high as you'd see and even that is somewhat less likely... And by "in the field", I mean carrying a firearm, shooting, and being shot at, which is basically what's going on in the game. The airforce is an exception, since I believe anyone flying a jet has to be an officer for the most part. To that end, if you want to be "realistic", the player is the general (directing the troops, taking the larger view) and really anyone running around the map shooting stuff is not going to be much more senior than a lieutenant, possibly a captain. That having been said, clearly realism is not the most important consideration in the game, so why not drop the arguments on what's "realistic" or not and focus on what adds the most to the gameplay. I like the idea of having a dual track of NCOs and officers, and the idea that officers add value primarily by boosting the stats and morale of the other guys. I'm especially fond of the idea that once a soldier is designated as an officer (and this would almost have to be an active choice by the player or it could suck a lot), they earn experience primarily through the actions and success of their troops rather than their own actions. My personal opinion of the sergeants extending the area of influence of the officers is that that would be taking it too far - you're then essentially creating 3 different classes of soliders - officers, NCOs, and regular soldiers whereas I think a 2 class split is sufficient - officers and non-officers should do the trick. I'm also a fan of the idea that up to a certain point (probably around the 3rd of 10 ranks, for example), promotions happen automatically upon achievement of certain milestones (x missons, or y successful missions, or z combined stat gains, etc.) and after that, are discretionary based on accumulated points (ie you can choose who to promote and into which channel). It would also be interesting to have "achievements" or "specialties" whereby individual troops get special bonuses for achieving certain milestones (ie "make 50 aimed shots" gives you a "sniper" achievement, with an accuracy or AP bonus to using DMR class weapons (would not apply to assault rifles, shotguns, pistols, etc.)) Note that this would require that all or most alien weapons be "classed" as, for example "Sniper weapons" "Assault weapons" "Shotgun type weapons" "pistols", etc. and that this would not have to be restricted to weapons, the idea could also be applied to equipment (medic, grenadier, etc.)

I'm very much in favor of the idea of having pre-saved loadouts that you can use to assign an equipment load-out to a soldier with just a click (or a few). The addition of visible icons for each role would be nice, but I'd argue that this should be considered additional to the prior mentioned ability. Also, to address the issue of you taking a sniper's rifle away and giving him a pistol instead, you can set it up so that if a soldier's loadout is modified, he gets the same icon, but with a tweak (for example, a small exclamation point or a red dot). Alternatively, and more drastically, if it's modified, the icon goes away...

Sorry - one more related suggestion - suppressive fire from the troop transport immediately prior to landing (at least in and around the landing zone itself) would be a nice possibility...

I'm well aware that the FAQ states that there will be no artillery because it reduces the excitement of the game... 2 points though: 1 - How many chinooks have you ever seen that don't have at least mounted machine guns if not heavier support weapons? Clearing the landing area prior to landing and/or protecting your troops during deployment just plain makes sense... 2 - If you require "spotting" in the form of using a laser designator or similar, artillery doesn't have to be a god-like super-power, it just gives you another way to attack a problem. It allows a lightly armed, mobile unit to designate a target for a more powerful artillery piece that is either fixed on the transport or even fired from the air/space. It is not risk-free or lacking in tension as the designating unit still has to have some form of sight (even if it's only on the outside of a building the alien is hiding in) and it's not necessarily overpowered because presumably it would require some resource investment to acquire such abilities... Just a thought...

I agree you should be able to reserve APs on a squad-wide basis (matter of fact I think you should be able to do almost everything reasonable on a squad-wide basis to minimize unnecessary clicking)... I also think it would make sense to allow you to reserve APs for as many things as you want (for example, to specify enough AP to kneel, turn within a 180 degree radius, and fire 2 snap shots)... I remember in the original X-Com, reserving enough for an aimed shot in order to ensure that I would have enough AP to kneel and still take a snap-shot in reaction. I would then have to turn off the reserve for aimed shot at the end of the turn in order to kneel and face the appropriate direction. Pointlessly annoying, I think...

In the original X-Com, you started the tactical missions with virtually no vision on the map. This seems to be somewhat unrealistic... You would have at bare minimum done a visual scan of the landing zone (if not the entire mission area) immediately prior to landing, and more likely than not would also have more advanced scanning systems (radar, infrared, magic alien technology) which would give you increasing amounts of info based on your tech level (starting from ow many aliens there are on the map, going on to what kinds/races of aliens they are, all the way up to what kind of equipment they are carrying...) Naturally, the aliens would have technology that would allow them to obscure themselves to an extent (for example, an appropriately shielded ship would conceal the number and type of aliens in it), but it would require a lot of effort, for example, to totally conceal a big alien tank with a massive weapons system waiting right outside your transport's door to waste you when you walk out. Also, aliens would be forced to choose where and when to deploy this cloaking/sensor shielding tech and wouldn't be able to necessarily deploy it to every mission. Thus it would be a race for the humans to improve their sensor systems and the aliens to assign more resources to their cloaking systems (as opposed to heavier weapons, more missions, etc.). This would be a decision the AI would have to make for the aliens as the humans developed more advanced sensor tech and deployed it. Yes, the original X-Com had motion detectors or similar, but my point is that even today we have better sensor tech than that and this is sci-fi! Other major point is that in most cases, landing completely blind is unrealistic and makes the game unnecessarily difficult. The landing craft should at least have basic visual scanning of the landing zone if not the entire battlefield.

Since deploying out of the narrow doors of a transport is one of the most vulnerable times in a mission, it would be cool to be able to research the ability to drop your troops into the battle... Whether this is by parachute, fast-roping from a helicopter, or more advanced transportation tech stolen from aliens (a la Star Trek transporters), I think this might add to the game...

I think it'd be nice to have the ability to set up (and even better, save once set up) formations and then move groups of soldiers in formation. For example, the ability to form a squad consisting of a machine gunner, 2 riflemen, and a medic, arrange them so they're covering each other, and then move them all at once while keeping them in formation, would be very useful for crossing open spaces (one click instead of 4). You would, of course, break up the "autopilot" when an enemy was spotted (similar to how movement stopped when you spotted an alien in the original X-Com), but for covering space, it would be useful... It would be even cooler if you could "script" or save deployment patterns out of the transport... These suggestions come from the parts of the game I found tedious in the original X-Com...

Will the game be playable in OSX? Failing this, would it be possible to make some effort to see that it runs well in VMWare Fusion? I know Boot Camp is an option for Mac users, but you can't beat native OSX support! =)