Magnum-nauts

[Mikhail Ragulin]

Download & Installation

This has moved to the completed mods sub-forum, over here.

What is Magnum-nauts?

Magnum-nauts is a weapons replacement mod for Xenonauts. It follows on from Magnum Force, which was only for v21, and is compatible with the full game. The concept is that the Magnum-nauts have to fight the alien threat by using only ballistic weapons - no more lasers, plasmas, or MAGs, for the ground troops, as we cannot yet harness that technology into portable infantry weapons, (we can only manage bulky lasers etc., which means they can only be vehicle-based).

But why's it called Magnum-nauts? What's that all about? Well...it's because we get our combat revolvers from Smith & Wesson, makers of a variety of magnum calibre weapons, punk. The most famous of which, popularised by Dirty Harry, is the model 29 .44 cal magnum, which, you guessed it, is in this mod. Not once, but twice.

Unlike in Magnum Force, there are no "prototypes" or "experimental" weapons, meaning all the weapons are pre-1980. Our scientists have found that the key to defeating the aliens could come from weapons from an earlier era; before the modern standardisation of calibres. Many of these weapons could be classed as outdated for man-on-man warfare, but our analysts theorise that the larger calibre weapons could prove to be very effective against the ET's.

The weapon progression follows the same concept as vanilla - there are four researchable "tiers", providing our troops with better weaponry. This is mainly achieved through procuring larger calibre weapons for the troops. However, in Magnum-nauts, there is a greater variety of weapons - a total of ten different classes, adding 38 new weapons to the game (and at the same time, removing the vanilla weapons). The classes are as follows:

- shotguns

- SMG's

- assault rifles

- battle rifles

- anti-tank rifles

- machine guns

- explosive launchers

- revolvers

- machine pistols

- melee

They can be found under five different tabs:

- breaching (shotguns and SMG's) - formerly the ballistic tab

- rifles (AR's, BR's, and AT) - formerly the laser tab

- heavy (MG's and explosive) - formerly the plasma tab

- sidearms (revolvers and MP's) - formerly the MAG tab

- melee (which is located where the rocket ammo tab used to be)

This picture shows the new tab system, and some of the weapons:

The mod is balanced by respecting the vanilla GC system, and erring on the side of caution. Meaning that the idea is to have the weapons be roughly 10% less powerful across the board. However, there are some weapons that defy this, and are below this threshold (as I reckon the late-game guns, especially MAGS, are overpowered), so generally the game play is a little bit harder than vanilla. There is a link to the stats in the "stats" section near the end of this post.

There are some changes to how the existing weapons classes operate. The semi-auto shotguns, and the full auto one, can now burst fire. AR's, to reflect their dominance in modern warfare, are capable of burst firing twice per turn. This makes them effective at all ranges...unlike in vanilla, where they are crap at all ranges. Heavy weapons (AT's, mg's, explosive) suffer a move penalty, and recoil is a factor for more weapons. This is all explained in-game via tool-tips in the soldier equip screen.

And speaking of the equip screen...you may have noticed the reduced backpack and belt sizes in the picture. This affects how the player will equip the Magnum-nauts. Primary weapons (apart from SMG's) no longer fit in the bag, spelling the end for the "universal soldier" effect. Medikits now fill the bag, and have therefore given birth to the medic class. Want healing? Shout "MEDIC". I do, pilgrim. Anyhow, here's some more waffle about the new classes...

Breaching

SMG's are roughly the same power as shotguns. Capable of 3 bursts per turn, due to their high rate-of-fire, they can be devastating up-close...in the right hands. Weaker soldiers may not be able to handle the recoil, and could end up spraying into the wind. Here's a tastefully-arty Clint to show you our breaching selection:

Rifles

AR's are capable of burst fire, and twice per turn at that. Our BR's do not have this function - however, their larger cartridge size gives them more power. They do not suffer from recoil like AR's do, as only weapons that are capable of burst fire have this drawback. BR's are a cross between the vanilla AR's and snipers. The AT's, or anti-materiel rifles, are immensely powerful (the most powerful line of weapons that the 'nauts can field) yet very cumbersome, capable of firing only once per turn. Here's the lot:

Heavy

The MG's are capable of firing once per turn, and the number of bullets per burst is relative to their RoF. The explosive weapons replace the vanilla rocket system...the last two are devastating, as they are automatic grenade launchers. Devastating to both sides if in the wrong hands, as they have enormous recoil and low base accuracy. Take it away, ghostly Clint:

Sidearms

The pride of the Magnum-nauts arsenal. All of our sidearms are one-handed weapons, and can fit in the backpack (they are, along with the SMG's the only weapons that can fit). The revolvers all retain the vanilla firing systems, with the exception of the scoped 29, which also has an accurate ranged shot option. The MP's are nasty little buggers, spitting out two bursts (of varying lengths) per turn, but have a range similar to the shotguns (about half that of the revolvers). Feeling lucky?

More features

- UI improvements in the equip screen. A larger drop-ship assignment button so that it really stands out. Also, assignment window (bottom left) is larger, which means no more scrolling or cut-off names.

- Weapons are no longer manufactured. To balance this out, armours have had a 50% increase in build time (keeps the engineers busy), and doubled cost (to account for getting the new weapons for free). The process of researching the weapons has been extended by 50%, so the time taken from initialising research to fielding the weapons is roughly the same as vanilla. Seems to play out quite well. Manufacturing weapons that are available on the market doesn't make sense, so this is how I've circumvented it.

- Drop-ship capacity. Charlie increased to 10, Shrike 11, and Valkyrie stays at 12. This is to stop the feeling of soldier bloat that can creep in when getting a new drop-ship. Getting a new drop-ship in vanilla usually sets off my loss of interest. However, with just an increase of 1 soldier capacity, it makes role choice more important - that extra troop is valuable, as opposed to a bloated feeling. Also, early UFO's have got extra personnel in them, making ten troops seem just about right. Ten troops also allow more tactical load-outs, especially when coupled with the smaller backpacks.

- Nades. Flashbangs need researching, they come with stun weapons now. Makes them Caesan and Seb light scouts much more fun. Stun gas is replaced by tear gas (which, strangely, knocks out some aliens) which comes later on. Other nades (alenium, plasma, etc.) are gone, which of course raises the difficulty. Nades are too much of a "get out of jail free card", especially the electroshock and stun ones. So, stunning is carried out via the new truncheon, tear gas (has a smaller cloud than vanilla stun gas), and cattle prod, which is surprisingly effective against robotic enemies. The truncheon and the prod are smaller than the vanilla baton, and can fit on the belt or in the bag. Range on nades is slightly less too (15), just less than a revolver (16).

- Armours. Specifically, predator. The "big guns" that the predator can use are all of the mg's, explosives, and AT's.

- Mission & kill counts in the ground combat equip window. The kill count updates during the mission too.

- The odd graphic change, here and there. There's a new launcher screen (so one knows that one has loaded Magnum-nauts), white smoke in the smoke grenade...and these new, alarming, difficulty images...

Nothing quite says "you shouldn't be playing on easy mode" like this picture.

Hints/tips

It's pretty hard early on due to the extra ET's in the UFO's. Breaching isn't an option until stun is researched, so blow the doors off instead (I usually use C4, but just shot one through with an AT rifle). Take advantage of the diverse weapons...in a ten man squad, i have a shotgun, smg, AT, 2xAR, 2xBR, mg, explosive, and a dedicated medic (sidearm of choice, one medpack in bag, one in hand). Don't waste carrying capacity with medikits for all. Treat the AT rifle like a mg or launcher...keep it hidden/stationary until there's a clear target, then it's a one-shot killer. Don't move before firing it, as the heavy weapon penalty kills it (along with the mg's and explosives).

The 'nauts start off with no weapons equipped, so make sure you arm them before the first battle (this is because all vanilla guns are out of the game).

Edited July 2, 2014 by Mikhail Ragulin

[TacticalDragon]

Interesting work, It worth test it.

Thanks!

[Ogaburan]

Cant wait for this!

[Kleinburger]

Love it ! Can't wait.

[kabill]

Did you want me to add this to the mod list?

[jupilerke1967]

its a very nice mod but i am missing real sniper rifles the antimaterial rifles doesnt work for me because they where used to do dam to armored vehicles and most off them you can only use in crouched position.

[Kargan]

Fantastic Work.

[jupilerke1967]

even worse you have to lay down to fire those antimaterial weapons because off recoil,allso the enfield is an single shot weapon so thats not giving youre xenonauts an advantage.

Edited June 7, 2014 by jupilerke1967

[Kargan]

I'm a lot interested to this mod. When it will be ended?

[Mikhail Ragulin]

Updated first post with download link.

[Kargan]

Thank you Mikhail.

[catmorbid]

Hey, looking great! I'll look forward to testing this out at some point

[Mikhail Ragulin]

Well, being squad-wiped by a bunch of big sexy Androns has given me the opportunity to work on the next update instead.

There will be a further expansion of the weapon classes. This is based on the roles of the weapons - for example, some weapons are situational, and some are versatile. Each class will have a mixture of both. The best way to describe this is by looking at the current rifle class. here we have AR's, BR's and AT's. The AR's are versatile weapons, i.e. they can perform at all ranges. The AT's are situational weapons - they lack the versatility of AR's, and are only good for certain situations. The BR's straddle both the categories, but are more versatile than situational. A nice mix which allows for a variety of tactics and play-styles. Let'a take a look at our other current primary weapon classes...

Breaching: At the moment, both breaching weapons are situational...they excel at short-range, but lack a ranged attack. Therefore, arise Sir Carbine:

Or if you're American...Carbean. And yes, my weapon images are getting better (I'll probably go back and standardise all the images at some point). Anyway, these aren't your run-of-the-mill carbines. None are fully automatic (so no burst fire), and one is even a bolt-action. However, they have power, and accuracy. They've taken on the stats of the AR's (accuracy wise) and can pop off 4 shots per turn (to compensate for a lack of burst fire). The range is just over half that of an AR, double that of a shotgun, and 33% more than an smg. Which makes them a nice little versatile weapon that is reliably accurate at short to mid range, but lacking the brute force of the shotguns and smg's.

More weapon news to follow...

There's also some new UI stuff, including:

This movement is hidden, punk.

Big-ass clipboard in the barracks screen. This allows me to see all of my soldiers, and all of their stats. Makes it easy to decide who should be which role as all the stats are visible and sortable. There's 19 troops on that list, I reckon that 25 could fit on there.

[Mikhail Ragulin]

Here's the rest of the weapon changes for the next installment...

So, we're already getting a new set of shiny carbines to play with. They fill the versatile role for the breaching class, which means that the rifle and breaching classes are looking complete. But what about the heavy class?

What about it, indeed. At the moment, it is populated by a mix of mg's (ranging from light to heavy), and launchers. All of which are situational weapons, as opposed to versatile. Which means we need some versatility in there, right? Say hello to my little friends:

These puppies provide the versatility. They are classed as lmg's, and bring mobility to the class that was previously lacking. They don't suffer from the heavy weapon move penalty, and can spurt out two bursts of five rounds each per turn. Designed to fire from the hip, they lack accuracy and also the raw firepower of the other mg's. They make up for this though by providing heavy mobile firepower and suppression - ideal for the on-the-go soldier.

So, the Bren found it's way into a new class, which means a further diversification of the heavy class. We've got lmg's...so maybe there should be something heavier. I dunno, maybe gpmg's?

That's right, some big nasty buggers. Heavier (in weight and caliber) to the lmg's, these act like the vanilla mg's. They are situational weapons, and suffer from the heavy weapons move penalty, but just like the AT rifles in the rifle class, they bring devastating power when used with appropriate tactics.

So, the heavy class now consists of one versatile weapon range (lmg's), and two situational choices (gpmg's and launchers). The launchers are staying the same as they are now, I've no further changes planned for them. Same too with the sidearms...both the situational (machine pistols) and versatile (revolvers) classes are covered there already. The heavy mg's that are currently in the heavy class (nsv, m2hb) will be finding their way onto vehicles sometime in the future, as they are no longer available to ground troops.

[Chefsbrian]

I must say, I've been playing with this, minus some tweaks of my own, and the idea of diversifying the light and heavy MG's is very nice. Previously I've not really brought the Heavy MG's to bear much outside of terror missions. These light LMG's will see awesome use during the larger UFO's and alien bases, where we have shorter ranges, but still need more firepower than the SMG's bring to the front.

that and browning made an awesome automatic rifleman.

[Mikhail Ragulin]

I must say, I've been playing with this, minus some tweaks of my own, and the idea of diversifying the light and heavy MG's is very nice. Previously I've not really brought the Heavy MG's to bear much outside of terror missions. These light LMG's will see awesome use during the larger UFO's and alien bases, where we have shorter ranges, but still need more firepower than the SMG's bring to the front.

that and browning made an awesome automatic rifleman.

Yeah, there's a lot of threads about mg's and how they should work (if one goes back through the forum pages), be it five or ten round bursts. I guess no one really bothered with the idea of having two mg's yet (apart from smg's). Having the vanilla mg's (like our gpmg's) bursting more than once per turn would make them overpowered...they nail nearly everything they shoot at, so doing that twice per turn would be overkill. But a slightly less powerful one seems to work.

I've also reduced the suppression radius for the standard mg's (2 radius instead of 4), which gets rid of the supress everything on the map effect. The LMG's have slightly less suppression (90 compared to 120, with a radius of 2) as they can fire twice per turn, and both have lower accuracy (gpmg's 15% for 10 bullets, lmg's 20% for 5). It seems to be working out nicely.

[Gengis Dhen]

Can anyone tell me which mods this is compatible with please and thanks.

[Mikhail Ragulin]

Can anyone tell me which mods this is compatible with please and thanks.

Probably not many at the moment. When I've done the next update (in a few days or so), I'll look at which ones can be used together (or easily integrated) and do a list.

Update news to follow...

Edited June 19, 2014 by Mikhail Ragulin

[Mikhail Ragulin]

And here is some update news.

The new version will be finished within a few days. In addition to the changes laid out in the above posts, I've also been working on a few more things:

First up, there's been a few weapons replaced. The SMG category has had a full re-work. I've gone for the larger type of SMG, to differentiate them more from the machine pistols, as weapons like the MP5K kind of straddle the two. Also, I wanted to get rid of the more common weapons that are found in games/movies, which means the death of the MP5, MP5k, AK-47, SPAS-12, and H&k G3. They're noob weapons. Anyway, the new line of SMG's, and a tasty new AT rifle (which replaces the ridiculously heavy Solothurn):

Some beauties there, and the top two have enormous ammo drums. However, they shoot peas. And that big filthy AT rifle is on the third tier, meaning that the PTRS-41 has moved up to top-dog in the AT's.

AR's had a re-jigging, as the AK-47 and G3 have gone. Shotguns too, as I wasn't comfortable with burst fire shotguns - it was a convenient way of scaling damage, as they were all 12 ga. I managed to find a couple of big dirty 10ga to fill the upper tiers - the Ithaca Mag-10 and the Winchester M1901. So, that means bye-bye to the SPAS and the Atchisson. The explosives category, which was filled by half-arsed grenade launchers, has been replaced by the solitary RPG-7. We nearly had a line of Panzerfausts, people, but one couldn't get single-shot weapons to work.

Also in the weapons news, there's been a standardisation of recoil (SMG's all do 50, LMG's 60) instead of the sliding scale that is currently in. I'll explain this though when I put the download up. And Ar's were a bit to powerful with the two 3-shot bursts per turn. So, behold the double-tap. They now do a two-shot burst (still twice per turn), that is a tiny bit more accurate. And has a cool new sound-effect, but maybe not as cool as the new SMG sound...which is just adorable. There's been more standardisation across the tiers...bigger calibers equal better guns in all the tiers now, as in some (SMG's, MP's, and shotguns) I was using more shots (or more shots per burst) to simulate progression. So, I'm pretty happy with how the weapons are structured, and extremely pleased with the diversity they offer.

Another thing I'm really pleased with is ground combat. I've done a few changes, which I'm still working on. The premise is that UFO's that are shot down yield next to no materials (alloys & alenium). The main source of these is now in landed UFO's (of which there are more). This has given variety to ground missions, as there is no need to enter the UFO in crashed missions, as they are all dead in there (the UFO is a mess). The landed missions, on the other hand, are pretty tough. There is also the danger of more night missions due to the need to secure materials from landed craft. It's development has mainly been occurring in this thread. The AI scripts have been jumbled up a bit too, which again helps with combat variety - sometimes the player is forced onto the defensive, which seems to have gone from vanilla. This depends on mission type and alien race. There's also another change, which I'll keep secret, to ground combat - it's remarkably simple and makes the battlefield more fluid, I'm enjoying it.

So, keep your eyes peeled as it'll be ready soon.

Almost forgot - here's some of what's planned for the future. Vehicles will be getting the ballistic treatment at some stage. And another thing to look at is the weapon images. At the moment, they're photo's - I'm far better at making them now than the first release. There are some ways at standardising these though, using filters, which would probably be more fitting with the rest of the game. I might turn my attention to it now that all the weapons and images are in place, and go for something along these lines:

In hindsight, maybe the StG 44 wasn't the best choice, as that's one of my better images. However, if one zooms in the effect becomes more apparent. The top one is the current image, then the three below have been run through a filter. I copied the image into a new layer, gave it 50% transparency, and then applied an oil painting filter. It comes in 3 choices - rough , medium, or high. I like them all. From a cleaning up perspective the high and medium ones would mean less work. High might be too smooth, I'm not sure, I'll probably go with medium. Or high.

Edited June 21, 2014 by Mikhail Ragulin

[Khall]

I was able to get oneshot weapons to work a while a go:

http://www.goldhawkinteractive.com/forums/showthread.php/8341-Implementing-Particle-Cannon-and-DHVRL?highlight=DHVRL

The code is included in the thread, the most important thing is the use of IsMonoUse, which I set to 1. Once you used the DHVRL it automatically disappeared. This was a while ago, but should still be possible. Though I do remember having some problems when manufacturing them, the ammo wouldn't load automatically in the soldier equip screen even though it was set to infinite, I never got round to solving it. Hope it helps

[Mikhail Ragulin]

I was able to get oneshot weapons to work a while a go:

http://www.goldhawkinteractive.com/forums/showthread.php/8341-Implementing-Particle-Cannon-and-DHVRL?highlight=DHVRL

The code is included in the thread, the most important thing is the use of IsMonoUse, which I set to 1. Once you used the DHVRL it automatically disappeared. This was a while ago, but should still be possible. Though I do remember having some problems when manufacturing them, the ammo wouldn't load automatically in the soldier equip screen even though it was set to infinite, I never got round to solving it. Hope it helps

Aha! Thanks, I'll go in for round two.

Update: It works. Hello disposable RPG's.

Edited June 21, 2014 by Mikhail Ragulin

[mvm900]

Yo, what's with the inclusion of crappy stereotypical Russian weapons but none of them that were either actually in use by the 80s or ones that have been made by the 80s..?

[Ogaburan]

What crappy stereotypical Russian weapons? All i see is awesomeness...

Whats with the crappy attitude?

It hurts the realism of the alien invasion?

Coz back then, in the 80's, when the aliens invaded they didn't have that specific gun?

[Mikhail Ragulin]

Yo, what's with the inclusion of crappy stereotypical Russian weapons but none of them that were either actually in use by the 80s or ones that have been made by the 80s..?

Well, that's kind of the point. As explained in the first post, most of the weapons used would be considered obsolete by the time the game is set in, due to the standardisation of cartridge sizes for NATO. It's not just the Russian weapons that are out-dated.

I've included Russian ones for a couple of reasons. Firstly, diversity. I aiming for a weapon selection from all over the world. And secondly, which will most likely apply to anyone doing a mod with more than one ballistic tier, is that the Russian calibres are slightly larger than their western counterparts, which is important when it comes to differentiating between the damage levels of the tiers.

Take the AK-47, for example. Now, this isn't in the next edition - it's explained a few posts back that the more well-known/over-used weapons are being culled - but it fit quite nicely. The M'nauts Xenopedia explains that the gun was selected for use due to both its damage model and its versatility, which allows it to function in a variety of climates, and is therefore ideal for the M'nauts. From frozen wastelands to sandy deserts, it works.

As for the other Russian weapons, they all fill a niche. The SVT-40, although aged, provides more punch than the L1A1 due to it's larger round. Same too for the PTRS-41. All the weapons in the AT department are obsolete - the Mauser was finished after WW1, the Boys at the advent of WW2. But, in M'nauts, that doesn't matter - progression doesn't necessarily involve inventing new weapons or going for smaller calibre modern guns - it means delivering maximum ballistic firepower to the battlefield, no matter what the era.

[ToothlessShark]

I love this mod. It has style, it has power and it has attitude.

Thanks for making this.

Now I'm going back to kill those alien punks.

Edited June 23, 2014 by ToothlessShark