Theoderich

This means I must go out there and capture some big game... ah well. To the hunt then!

I tried..and failed. Must try again sometime... Especially with Vipers. I in the beginning it was so hard to kill them that capturing was definetly not a concern, and now they die too fast. The problem is: It sees like you need to crack their armour first to be able to effectively stun them. But judging the right moment to switch to stuns is hard, especially since I try to NOT let them get close, so I don't usually have a shocker close enough to do it. Capturing a Gargole should be easier, a soldier in Wolf armour or beyond is mostly imune to them,so he( or she) got aaaalt the time in the world to bring that baton to bear. And I would like to hop on the praise wagon for the Xenopedia-entries for the new aliens

I think the answer is yes, at close range. But I never tested it myself.

I do play only on normal and without iron man after all. Although I safe less and less now. But it was extremely helpfull in figuring out out how to manouver against the new aliens and weapons. Of course I did loose soldiers to poor tactics..but then I reload ( really a pain sometimes, since I don't save every turn). But I don't reload for wounded soldiers. Sometimes they limp away with 4 hp

Don't back down in the difficulty. I am managing so far on Normal, 23rd February 1980. Air-War is a bit tight, currently building a new base and nearly finished outphasing Cheburashkas to correct that. On that note,a possible bug report: I got heavy plasma weapons, but not lasers. Which is fine for my aircraft, those that can use plasma weapons now. But my base turrets didn't upgrade and still fire missiles Since I don't play iron man mode I didn't even loose a soldier(NOT playing the rng though). I did need to retreat from combat twice though, back when I didn't have plasma weapons. And I don't even use vehicles, which would probably make things easier, them being imune to melee attacks and all that. The dissasembly mechanic is explained ingame! The Xenopedia popups basiclly tell you what to do. At least the general direction. And like Sentinel said: Don't leave all ballistics at home. I mostly do by now, since: Plasma, but I always got a gatling yielding heavy around for gargoles. Alternatively build decryption centers. I got only one, but most things shot down in Asia tell me what the crew was, so I can adjust the loadout: Gas and a few ballistics for Sebellians, electro-grenades and just plasma for Ceseans.

Use vehicles. They laugh at Vipers, since they are immune to melee attacks. If you don't bring them, like me, use explosives, or RUN! With a bit of tricky timing I once even managed to complete a mission despite an omega viper(the one spitting poison clouds) showing up and me having no lasers yet. I had one soldier lure it away from the ufo, then stormed that with the rest and held it for 5 turns. That was on a rather open desert map though, would probably not work in an urban environment. The first delta I actually killed fell to several alenium grenades, lots of ballistics fire and a handfull of laser shots. Others reported using traps of multible C4 ignited with a flamer once the big guy is in the middle of it. They ARE hard to kill. At least till you get plasma weapons. A veteran soldier with a plasma carabine can kill a delta viper on his/her own. So can one yielding a plasma caster in a predator armour. So endure the hardness of the humble beginnings you WILL strike back. As for Androns: Yeah, their durability makes them difficult to kill. But they are slow, and in contrast to most biological enemies don't regenerate health, so hit and run or sieging them is always an option.

Weird bug: Sometimes switching bases in the hangar tab, or going to the hangar on some bases crashes the game. After some trial and error it seems like it only happens with bases that are currently disassembling some ufo. The actual type does not seem to matter. one of my crashing bases is disassembling a corvette, the other a cruiser. Edit: After the Corvette one finished, I could get into their hangar without trouble.

Maybe he means killed by explosions in GC, in which case a survival shown in the results screen would be suspicious? Are those explosions caused by alien grenades or heavy plasma weapons ventuswings? Or is it a vortex weapon, in which case the soldier is probably stunned, not dead and could even be "revived" on the battlefield using a medkit.

Some stuff gets unlocked by dissasembling of ship cores from corvette onwards. But nevertheless, depending on what you find on the battlefield techs can be difficult. I for one got plasma weapons, including the heavy ones for aircrafts, but never had had heavy lasers, and researched the bigger laser sniper and the advanced laser pistol after having heavy plasma and plasma explosives

Lots of stuff can only be effectively stunned if you wear down their armour first I think. Just going with prods at a Praetor yielded nothing, doing single digit stun damages per hit. But after 2 blasts with a plasma carabine the prods did stuns in the upper 20s. ( Killed it anyway in the end. Because a dead it went to research, alive it was sold. For 15k though.

Although bad for game balance that makes kind of sense. Landing ships are described as transports, so having them carry large amount of stuff around, like ammo for the troops, would be reasonable

In need of a gameplay tip. I am assaulting an alien base ( the one with the 3 Deltas I mentioned earlier). Well, I left it alone for a while and it upgraded. So did I. Plasma weapons made short work of those Deltas as well as the new resident Omega Viper. The Ceasans and teleporters were dealt with as well, but now it comes to assaulting the control room. It contains at least 5 Ceasan elites + leader (which I would prefer alive ) and one bony white really dangerous psychic I've not seen before. As soon as I enter that corridor the Ceasans storm out bombing the crap out of my guys and galls, with the survivors usually being supressed and consequently vulnerable to bersercking and mind control, which turns out badly. Especially if they get my carabine guy. Edit : Seeming to make some headway. Sent some guys all the way around to some sealed bulkhead, blew that and now got another angle of attack on the command room entrance, getting them into a crossfire. Edit 2: Nearly made it. Getting shot at from 2 directions confused them enough to let my troops survive the siege. now only the ( looked it up) Preator is missing. Not hard to kill actually, plasma caster works wonders, but I want to try and get it alive

This might actually be a good idea With the penultimate hotfix being modular and the current one not it can get confusing. Especially since in general hotfixes often are not including previous changes, but yours do.

Like ventuswings and blackwolf already mentioned you can BUT be aware of a bug in CE 0.26 that might crash the game if you blow up a hedge (other objects seem fine). Just had it happen when throwing a plasma grenade on a gargole right next to a hedge. Oh and with enough firepower you can actually bring down whole buildings. Very handy if alines hide inside or you just need a clear line of sight to prevent surprise Vipers or grenades.

The tooltips will wait for balancing to stabilize, since they can't ( yet? ) be generated dynamically but are texts that would need to be changed by hand every time you do something to the weapons. Another tip for vipers: In bases use doors to your advantage. The 6TU needed for opening them can save lives by often make even a Delta viper stop in front of it without the Tu to attack you Then it's your turn and with a team of 4 or 5 people with lasers waiting right behind the door. And rejoice: Better armour helps too. I have seen ( on normal ) soldiers survive a hit by a Delta if they wear Wolf armour. They are critical and bleeding..but alive

C4 for the Blood God! Laser Weapons can do fine against Deltas though.. you just need to concentrate fire, best at close range. For example by moving the tank away from the buildings entrance you barricaded yourself in when there is no Viper to be seen, so it runs out of TU after entering the building, but before killing your soldiers. Then you can shoot it with everyone at Close range and kill it. Because I share your experience: Attrition doesn't work against something that can easily Regenerate 70+ HP ( on normal difficulty). Wouldn't risk it in Iron Man mode of course If more then one enteres the building you're propably dead. Alternatively position your team close to a civilian. Vipers usually go for those first. And then they run out of TU to attack you Tricky with multible Deltas though.

Normal And no Sulphurs. I Leave those at home when assaulting bases.. close spaces and burst fire explosives are something I try to avoid It was one Laser sniper,one laser rifle, one laser carabine and one advanced ballistics rifle. But it was only 2 tiles away so next to no misses, and that makes the carabine extremely powerfull. On another note: I got a feature suggestion: Could the time to transfer stuff be made dependent on the travel distance? As far as I know it always takes 24h, no matter the relative position of the 2 bases in question.

Delta Vipers can be dealt with. You "just" need to have your whole team ready for concentrated fire, hopefully including either Sulfurs or lots of lasers ( plasma weapons should work too I think, just arrived there and still building ). Once I even got one down with a team of 4. That was in an alien base though and my team was opening a door at full TU with the Viper right behind it. You really get to fear them if they come in a group. My veteran team got slaughtered in a base when 3 of those came around. I lost 6 of 8 in a single turn. Granted, the Cesean elites drawing my reaction fire and those damm teleporting telepaths making one of the survivors go berserk didn't help either... that base just sits there till I can come back with more firepower!And I will

Glad to hear that. I can see the need for a break though And if the complaints come again: Always remember: There are developers out there there that work full time on their games, ask 40 , 50 or more bucks for the game and have a higher bug density! So who can really blame a mod developer doing this in their free time for a handful of bugs?

The missing toolptips are here to stay till weapon balance is finalized by the mod devs. The reason is that they are simple texts, so they would have to be changed by hand every time a weapon changes in any way. Another tip: Don't stop too close to corners , a gargole or viper running around a building corner and your people standing right behind it can loose you half your squad in a single turn. And avoid night battles. Already a good idea in vanilla, but even more important here. Vipers coming out of the dark, leaving you no chance of reaction shots..well you get the picture. But most of all keep going.Once you got research going and your troops get a bit of experience things start to get better. Of course some enemies still inspire to urge and need to retreat, but veteran soldiers get way better at hitting and reaction fire making gargoles and basic vipers easier to handle.

Ah. Wasn't sure if it was FithH or vanilla. And of course one can deal with it. Especially with explosives and Buzzards.

Indeed To chime in: I think the reaction modifier on gargols is not too bad as it is. My veterans are able to hit them with it and more important( to me): It makes sense that they don't get much reaction fire, especially by rookies, because they are fast. And since the game doesn't give aiming modifiers dependent on previous turns movement this is the only way to simulate the fact that hitting something that just raced though your field of view is hard to hit, especially when you couldn't see it coming due to buildings. About fireing angles: It might seem unfair sometimes, but I have yet to see a really unfair situation. They shout diagonally from corners, and then are unhittable behind it but that makes sense. My only problem in that direction is landing ships, you probably all know it: You can't see aliens on the gallery of the cargo hold, but they can see you below and shoot you of course. Once you see them with someone on the upper floor you can shoot upwards with people downstairs. But of course that is a not a XNT specific issue

Indeed. I am gratefull too. it IS a great mod. Sure it got a bug here and there, but nothing major in my experience so far. And that is is only natural in a big project like this. And people complain more easily then praise. About the difficulty: I play on normal and I do save.. but I reload a LOT more often than in vanilla ( to try different moves, not to wait for the RNG to favor me mind you ). And that is fine. By now I am in a tight spot air-combat wise, and delta vipers still are one hell of fight.. but that makes it better, not worse! And not once did I need to retreat. I even managed a terror site with nothing but vipers ( by sacrificing most civilians though ), and a corvette with an Omega Viper. That one was quite fun to beat: I couldn't kill it without loosing half the squad, so I used one soldier, who could run fast, to lure it away from the UFO and stormed that with the rest of the squad, winning due to "hold ufo 5 turns". Saying : I really do enjoy the challenge, especially from the better AI. Which includes civilians if I am not mistaken: I've seen them retreating behind my lines a and going for the dropship in a sensible manner quite a few times now, instead of their vanilla behavior of running in circles waiting to get shot. Something I couldn't comment on initially since I wasn't there yet in the game: I have a love/hate relationship with the fact that ballistics don't just go obsolete with the advent of lasers. It forces you to make mixed squads and really has an impact on my tactics. Would love to have a way of seeing me what kind of enemy to expect on a mission so I could load up accordingly, but on the other hand going in blind does increase the challenge. And I get your frustration: Some of he questions over the last pages were just dumb or lazy. About 5 pages back is a 2 page long discussion about the M16/AK47 stats and a long explanation why there are no tooltips yet for the new weapons, but nevertheless it got asked again how many times since then? The corvette datacore disassembly thing is explained mostly in the Xenopedia. Which is btw well written and keeping true to the style of the game with the rather full of himself head of research

Had this once, but didn't report on it, since I could only reproduce it with that specific safe, loading an earlier turn fixed it. ( Yes, I don't play iron man mode, shame on me ), and assumed that the safefile got corrupted somehow. @silent_lord: How were you positioned? I felt that way too at first (no matter if modded or vanilla game), but then I realised that the angles from the gallery allow for shooting at least 2 tiles into the rooms next to the cargo hold.

About the max engineers question: I bet it's a base game limitation. Like you can't tell them to build 100 submachine guns, because the interface only allows 99. Wegen der Ingenieure: Ich fürchte das ist ein Problem des Basisspiels. Man kann auch keine 100 Maschienenpistolen bauen, das interface erlaubt maximal 99. Wegen der Regionen, das hat unser freundlicher Insulaner ja schon beantwortet. Edit: Completely of topic: I am amazed about the number of bilingual posts right now