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Recruiting soldiers and other personnel


Gazz

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I thought bad guys got green lasers and the good guys got red lasers?

Anyway, fundamentally the problem is one of achievement vs. ease of play. We can either have a situation where losing a squad of experienced soldiers can be a real blow to your organisation and possibly ruin a game that is otherwise going badly, or have one where losing a squad of experienced soldiers isn't that bad because you can replace them with the high quality rookies coming in because it's the end of the game (high quality due to any number of systems that have been suggested).

To me, we should be going with the former. The game's not meant to be easy, and if you totally screw up then you should be punished for it. It's a shame you got so close to the end of the game before you totally screwed up and lost, but you still screwed up.

Really, the trick would be to balance it so that the experienced troops are much better than the rookies, but not so much better that the two are in completely different leagues. I much prefer a system where increased stats give diminishing returns to one where the base stat level of the rookie improves over time to compensate for tougher aliens.

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  • 10 years later...
On 10/25/2011 at 5:35 PM, Gazz said:

3. Game progression and usefulness of rookies

One problem with all squad-level games is hiring recruits at an advanced stage of the game.

They are just too useless.

This leads to the feeling of to reload when any of the experienced troopers snuffs it. The loss just hurts too much when it takes months of game time to train a replacement trooper to a "useful" level of skill.

The problem for recruits later in the game is this:

1. There are no training centers.

2. There is no distribution of functions of fighters depending on their combat experience. This problem was solved even in the legions of the Roman Empire. Every legion (is a must!) consisted of conscripts, experienced and veterans. With the growth of combat skill, soldiers took a new place in battle formations and performed other combat functions.

In tactics at the level of the fighting compartment, this is difficult to organize. It's easier to form several tactical groups with different levels of combat experience and send these groups on missions of varying difficulty.

Or make a game based on platoon tactics. (4-7 combat groups of different experience, competence, professional bias).

Edited by Komandos
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On 10/25/2011 at 5:36 PM, Gauddlike said:

Have the specialists refreshed monthly and be more expensive.

The practice of playing X-Com: 1-2-3 (old) shows that it is more profitable to hire a lot of soldiers with poor starting characteristics cheaply than to hire a few soldiers, but with good ones. 

If a soldier has enough physical strength (to carry the minimum set of equipment without penalties to AP), then all other disadvantages can be compensated for by the number of these soldiers (tighter tactical formation, = greater firepower and greater density of fire on the ground at the enemy, = greater efficiency defeat the enemy).

Late Game Recruitment Problem in UFO: 1-2 - addressed by increasing the size of the battle group. If the "Ranger" (UFO: 1-2) at the beginning of the game could accommodate 14 soldiers, then the "Avenger" (at the end of the game) already accommodated 26 soldiers.

In terms of firepower and fire density, 26 recruits surpass 14 veterans.

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Edited by Komandos
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On 10/26/2011 at 1:13 AM, Chris said:

For training, it's not planned to be a full blown system any more. The micromanagement seems to be a waste of time to me. Instead, with the Drill Sergeant (or whoever we have on the Personnel screen) will have an option to put new recruits through basic training. 

If micromanagement is a system for making strategic decisions (affecting the course of the further game), then rejection of micromanagement = rejection of the strategy itself in the game.

Edited by Komandos
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On 10/26/2011 at 3:02 PM, Tweakd said:

The other option is to merge training with recruitment. Effectively the same thing as Gaudlike has said except I would go with a longer time delay as well as cost for better training. Again tied to how your performing in the game.

I agree with you. When applying for a job, you can add options: "month of study"; "Training two months." The soldier arrives at the Base with increased parameters, but ... - in a month or two.

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