NATOguns

''quote'' On the soft side, a single global organization with barely two hundred members (depending on how many you hired) can stop an alien invasion, UFOs can be beaten by 1980s jet fighters in dogfights, and the existence of psionics in general. ''end quote'' I can agree with that but the first one can get explained away by saying because of gameplay. Althought how I see the Xenonaut organization pre-invasion is just a a litteraly like in the lore. A couple of guys in a secret base who have hit on some hard times. And that the goverments know of the Xenonauts organization but see it more like a bunch of paranoid idiots because the Iceland Incident got covered up. Which is why theres so little funding for the Xenonauts in the start. With the airplanes is also more or less explained. The alien ships are meant for space, which is why the ships need to get modified to fly in our atmosfeer. The only ufos that can (in the start) are scout vessels which are generally the alien equivalent of the Model T-Ford. And even then the only airplane that had a chance to shoot these down is the F-17 Condor, in the lore it is only the Condor of the modern airforces that can shoot em down. Later you ofcourse upgrade your own airforce with new prototypes devopled from alien technology so the balance of power stays the same. Now for your points you brought up. 1. I agree with you there. The aliens should be more aggressive in there invasion. Even though SPOILER ALERT the Alien overlords are basically toying with us. However this could be changed. Further more the Xenonauts should be more the special forces branch of the invasion. Tasked with gathering new data/tech and handeling special operations (boarding, response to terror, VIP proctection). From this all earth should be able to up there arsenal. Shall we say that laser weapons are becoming commonplace so the normal soldiers can be equiped with them. Give em a fighting chance or make better missles/planes to shoot down ufos. Think World War Alien. 2. I kind made the this point in the start of my post. The more the Xenonauts show they can handle the situation, the more they can say about how to fight the aliens. (Giving orders to regular army units) 3. In start of the invasion Xenonauts is a largly forgotten organisation with a small budget but the better they handle the Invasion the more money they get. And in the end they get to commandeer the fighting worldwide. With a budget to match ofcourse. 4. There are alot of military installations worldwide. Under 1 unifed front those are almost impossible to destroy. Besides you could convert highways into improvised airstrips. The airplanes could be stored in a freaking garage for all we know. Dig underground factories. Convert the metro, etc etc etc. There are enough possibelties in keeping your production centrums intact. 5. The invasion should have different levels: pre-invasion, start-invasion, mid-invasion, longterm-invasion and finally end-invasion. Pre-invasion: How to make sure Xenonauts organisation survives to continue the fight. Start-Invasion: Alien scouting flottila arrives, attacks/bombs several cities, landing in remote areas to set up outposts for when the main force arrives after 4-5 months. (Gives time to make new weapons in high enough numbers) Still alot of infighting on earth for how to best handle the invasion. Xenonaut gaining support. Mid-Invasion: Forward elements of the main alien fleet arrive, start to invade small cities. Ground war erupts. By the end Xenonaut is leading/coordination the fight. Late-term Invasion: Main fleet arrives, major cities getting invaded, every country is fighting for dear life. Xenonauts looking for alternative way to win. End-Invasion: 2 outcomes (cause the humans are going to win), Aliens are fought to a stalemate and are going to wipe earth out with reapers/astroids/reapers-strapped-to-astroids). Xenonauts plan to blow up there mothership/leader so the rest of the Alien fleet suffers a distratous defeat and get defeated on the ground/air. Second outcome, we are defeated, hardly any military units left. Xenonauts only organisation left intact (1 base left, it ends like it starts) start a all or nothing attack on the Alien mothership to kill there leader. Outcome: Aliens are defeated either through superior/feriocous defense of earth, or by killing there leaders. So to recap: The conflict should be expanded, you start out small and grow bigger with each succes. The longer the fighting last the more there is a us versus them spirit (religion and politcal prevances are not very important when your house is getting nuked by ET) and in the end we win a hard fought victory.

With the XNT mod, having 5 aliens with a heavy plasma cannon blowing up half of the map in one turn

I was thinking in around the same lines as you for the new missions/maps. Those are cool to. And what I meant with the countries getting cheaper stuff is that sometimes on the worldmap a country succesfully shoots down a ufo. And that by adding some new technologies to research which increases that chance. Wouldnt require implenting new stuff. Just increasing the chance that countries can do that after you finish that research. So for example that by researching better SAM batterys for the funding nations they get an X % amount of increase in shooting down a UFO. Further more if you want to implent tougher UFO`s thats oke, then just limit the chance for shooting down bigger UFO by nations. Shall we say that scouts, bombers, fighers and corvette, could get shot down and the after that there isnt much chance.

I have been playing this mod for the best part of the last couple of weeks but still have a question. The dynamic ufo spawns means ufos can spawn randomally yet does this mean the crewlevels + current weapontech are random to? Cause sometimes i shoot down a light scout ufo and send my rookies to train on those missions yet the aliens in the ufo have the latest heavy plasma weapons. Is this intented or am I just unlucky?

I got a Chinese dude named ''Hee-Woo-Kang'' I kidd you not.

If you want to flesh out the cold war settings maybe add some new sorts of missions or events on the worldmap? Maybe a ''mission'' in which you are ordered to hold a area for X amounts of turns because a important general or leader got crossed in the crossfire and it takes a while before you can evec him. Also add an extra techtree which improve the abilities of nations to deal with the alien-invasion. Stuff like a cheaper version of the condor or foxtrot for the countries to use. Extra defense batteries around cities (X amount of chance of UFO's getting shot down).