jimbobfury
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Posts posted by jimbobfury
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Moonie, I've had that too. I've reported it in the bug section but Matthew said he's not having the same issue, so if you let him know it's not just me making things up then that'd be great! (if you haven't already done so, of course!)
Ah, I see you beat me to it by a good 8 hours...
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Hey all,
Great to see input from others relating to this. Thanks too to erutan for setting up the github. Have to be honest I've never used that but I'll definitely look into it when I have a bit more time this weekend.
Xenonut; I was thinking the same thing about influencing troop recruitment via certain research options. Rather than limiting recruitment, I thought more about getting a better grade of recruit once research had been completed maybe. This could represent establishing a programme with the US government to recruit Vietnam vets, for example. Or with the Soviets, in 1979 their army were just about to be sent into Afghanistan, so I thought a research programme could represent a deal being struck where the Xenonauts get to recruit the top 1% of active troopers who had been training for the upcoming deployment. In game terms this could lead to recruits being hired at corporal level, rather than as privates, maybe?
And Quartermaster, I 100% agree regarding the RPG being a more mobile but less accurate launcher. I like your idea of setting the weight so it could be used alongside another rifle type weapon too. I'll definitely try that out.
And thothkins, thanks for those links, definitely plenty to think about in there! I really hope it's possible to mod the game in the way that I'm hoping. I was actually wondering whether Chris might consider including some research options similar to the ones we're discussing as stretch goals for the kickstarter campaign, as he seemed to find the idea interesting too.
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Hmmm. Odd. This was with a squad of rookies from my second base, rather than with the starting troopers. Could that make a difference?
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Thanks for the offer and the suggestions erutan! If I'm able to get this off the ground to any meaningful degree, I'll definitely take you up on the offer.
I definitely agree that these research points should be worth doing in terms of a long term benefit, while still being balanced. I just like the idea of a choice as to how you shape your game. If you're struggling with ground combat missions, for example, then you'd probably be best researching the current content, to get better weapons and ammo. But if you're a tactics expert but you're cash flow is always terrible and your organisation skills leave a lot to be desired, then it might be better to research the proposed topics, to gain some advantages in that area so as to cover your weaknesses a little. Having the Soviet weapons linked to this may seem to go against that, but I thought it was as good a way as any to get them in game, and to provide a quick incentive to people for exploring this alternate research path.
I also like the idea of building up a little bit more backstory regarding how the Cold War powers might pull together to face the invasion.
Anyway, I've had nowhere near as much time to get stuck into this as I'd have liked tonight, but just as a test I've got the first research step in game, which leads to the ability to make limitless supplies of AK47 instantly (seeing as they can't be purchased, sadly) I've not got a clue how to go about affecting elements of the geoscape via research, so hopefully at some point I'll be able to get a bit of guidance regarding what's possible in that respect.
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My reasoning for taking away any sort of snap fire for the precision rifle was to either;
- make sure your sniper is never your point man. Keep him back, in a suitable firing position ready to make a shot at a moments notice or
- promote the use of weapon switching, so that he'd have a pistol as a backup weapon for moving to position, but a rifle in his pack for when he's ready to set up camp.
But, that's just me! That's the great thing about how easy the weapon stats are to mod, you can tweak it just how you like.
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The progress so far seems great! And it seems as if the previews have started sneaking out around the internet now too, so that will hopefully translate to more backers.
Here's one of the better previews I've read so far. Very indepth, and like all of the articles I've seen so far today, overwhelmingly positive!
http://www.armchairgeneral.com/xenonauts-pc-game-preview.htm
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Just out of curiosity, I'm assuming the demo is the same build as we're currently playing? I only ask because on the screenshots of the geoscape the interceptors have red lines connecting them to the UFO they're heading for and the Buzzard armour seems to be shown during the video.
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Hi everyone, this topic came up in another thread so I thought I should give it a thread of its own in the right place.
I'm hoping to add a research topic which basically represents making progress with thawing the Cold War tensions which grip the globe, even in the early stages of alien invasion. This will offer an alternative research tree, more focused on your financial stability and giving you other benefits, as opposed to straight up tech advantages.
The first step of researching this diplomatic route would open up the Soviet Weapons pack, representing a trade deal with the Soviet Union, or something along those lines. From there, assuming I can get it to work I intend to add more research topics which play to the same geo-political theme. As I said above, they'd run alongside the current alien based stuff, so you'd have a choice between where you wanted your focus to be; a unified Earth, battling the invasion together or going straight for the alien tech route, as in the current game.
Initial thoughts for the potential benefits/outcomes of pursuing these research subjects are (all dependent on what's possible of course)
- access to weapon variants from arms deals (eg; the Soviet Weapons pack when a deal is struck with them)
- Increased funding from various regions
- Cheaper recruitment costs
- Increased response times to alien threats, and maybe even a second chance at a terror site (delaying the current nuke strike via diplomatic means)
- Ability to build radar stations in regions, outside of your bases, which have a chance to intercept the 'alien events' such as "Tanker strafed, no survivors found", reducing the negative impact these events have on your performance.
- Higher number of friendly AI in regions with good relations
- Increased chance of soldiers surviving chopper crashes in friendly nations. (maybe even the chance that some soldiers could be recovered from a failed ground combat by a friendly nation's own forces?)
Obviously, they're all centered around how the different nations respond to you as an organisation, rather than how their relationships with each other change. If I can think of anyways to simulate nations putting aside their differences then I'd like to include that aspect too, but I think it may be that I just have to allude to that in the xenopedia outcomes of the research projects.
It will probably be that the Cold War nations put aside their differences to back the Xenonauts as a common ally, rather than them working directly together. But I think that will still achieve what I'd like to aim for.
I'd love to hear any thoughts people have, either on the idea in general (hopefully not "It's crap, Jim."
) or on specific research ideas, features or thoughts.Cheers all!
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Thanks!
Regarding the radar stations...how about
; once you've researched the 'Shared Satellite Network' topic, or whatever it could be called, you can build a/tap into a nations existing radar outpost in the same way that you build a full base, but at a fraction of the cost. You have a limited number of these that you can set up and each could allow a 50% chance of automatically intercepting the alien events that occur in a small area surrounding it. The benefit of this would be a reduction to the negative impact these events have on your standing with the nation where they occur. Also, assuming later in the game, that the level of alien activity in a region relates to their being an alien base nearby, these radar stations could increase your chances of locating the base sooner than you would do otherwise.
That's just off the top of my head, I'm sure with a bit more thought the idea could be made to work.
Anyway, sorry...I've completely derailed this thread! I'll start a topic in the modding forum.
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Thanks man, glad to see a couple of comments from people who'd be interested in the idea.
Initial thoughts for the potential benefits/outcomes of pursuing these research subjects are (all dependent on what's possible of course)
- access to weapon variants from arms deals (eg; the Soviet Weapons pack when a deal is struck with them)
- Increased funding from various regions
- Cheaper recruitment costs
- Increased response times to alien threats, and maybe even a second chance at a terror site (delaying the current nuke strike via diplomatic means)
- Radar stations in regions, outside of your bases.
- Higher number of friendly AI in regions with good relations
Obviously, they're all centered around how the different nations respond to you as an organisation, rather than how their relationships with each other change. If I can think of anyways to simulate nations putting aside their differences then I'd like to include that aspect too, but I think it may be that I just have to allude to that in the xenopedia outcomes of the research projects.
It will probably be that the Cold War nations put aside their differences to back the Xenonauts as a common ally, rather than them working directly together. But I think that will still achieve what I'd like to aim for.
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Hey, glad you like it Chris. I know things are going to be incredibly busy for you at the moment, but off the top of your head; do you know if factors such as regional funding and relationships could be tied into a research project?
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Glad you like the idea, Gorlom. Once I've got a bit more time to actually look into what's possible and what's not I'll post something a bit more definite about the idea in the modding forum. If you have any ideas in the meantime, feel free to throw them my way (unless you want to keep them for yourself, obviously!
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Hey man, I'd agree with this 100%. I'm not sure how realistic it is unfortunately, it sounds like it could be a lot of work but I'm with you in that it's something I'd definitely love to see.
I actually mentioned something similar in another thread; http://www.goldhawkinteractive.com/forums/showthread.php/1521-Soviet-Weapon-Alternate-Weapon-Images-released%21/page4
Ideally, I'd like to be able to influence regional funding and relations via research projects so you could add a geo-political element to the game, with various benefits relating to the support you receive from other nations such as extra funding, longer response times to crash sites and terror sites, second attempts at a failed terror site where you've negotiated the nation delaying their nuclear response and other things like that.
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I was thinking about this yesterday and while I like the hidden movement screen for nostalgia purposes, I do wonder if something more could be done during the aliens' turn.
How about during the AI turn you saw your soldiers, and when there was weapons fire or footsteps that would be close enough to hear, you get a visual indicator on screen to indicate the rough direction of where the sound originated from. This would represent the fact that even if they can't see an enemy, if an alien was shooting it's plasma rifle off behind a house to your left, you'd know that's where the sound was coming from. It would allow you to be planning even during the AI turn, rather than just waiting for your next turn.
If the system allowed, it could even add an extra layer of tactical depth and variety to the alien races. Caesans could be given a higher 'stealth rating' as it were, than Androns, for example. So you're more prone to being ambushed by a sneaky Caesan lurking behind a wall than you are by a clanking great robot/cyborg who's stomping through a nearby house.
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Good suggestions for the AK. I will probably tweak some other values as well. To be honest the default weapons might need some adjustment (magazine size comes to mind) however I was just concentrating on adding the Soviet ones for now. Of course all of this becomes a moot point as the ticker moves higher and the aliens become tougher- unless you are just an ironman masochist who wants to fight to the last man and the last bullet, whilst eschewing any alien weapon tech research
I imagine at some point in the game it will become practically impossible to continue without bettering your weapon technology.
Ha, I actually used to do that to some extent in the original Xcom; using good, old fashioned human weapons for as long as possible. There's just something more satisfying about downing a Muton with a clip full of man made bullets as opposed to a blob of filthy, alien plasma!
Re the Soviet weapons; I'm intending to add a research topic which basically represents making progress with thawing the Cold War tensions which grip the globe, even in the early stages of alien invasion. Researching this diplomatic topic would open up the Soviet Weapons pack, or something along those lines. If I can get it to work I'd personally like to add a few more research topics which play to this same geo-political theme. They'd run alongside the current alien based stuff, so you'd have a choice between where you wanted your focus to be; a unified Earth, battling the invasion together or going straight for the alien tech route, as in the current game. I can see why Chris hasn't really included this side of things in the base game, as it won't appeal to everyone, but I have to say, I love how open the file structure is for modding purposes. I've never modded a game before and Xenonauts is a piece of cake so far, which I think will result in a huge amount of fan made mods when the game is complete.
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Cool man, hope you like it when you test it out. I'm still not 100% happy with the balance between the Assault rifle and the Precision rifle so if you come up with any further changes along these lines then let me know!
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This has happened to me twice now, so I thought I'd best report it as a bug.
When I've lost a ground mission, after the debrief screen, the game crashes to desktop before switching back to the geoscape.
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Good to hear. Hope it is fixed soon so i can enjoy Tactical Missions more.
Out of interest, do you reload your game whenever a soldier dies then, or something like that? Does that not make the missions a little...boring?
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erutan, I've been playing with the following setup and I find it makes the weapons feel a little more balanced. See what you think (it's pretty much along the same lines as your suggestions anyway)
Assault Rifle - Increased the aimed shot to hit chance by about 10%, so that becomes your reliable option for finishing off a weakened alien. Reduced the AP required for burst fire to the same as aimed (25 for both) so you have a straight up choice between one reliable shot or 3 less accurate shots, but with a higher damage potential. Primarily for close ranged shots. Damage across the board is unchanged.
Shotgun - Reduce the ammo count to 8. Increase the reload time to 15 AP. So, this is now your go to weapon for highly damaging close range engagements, but you're punished if you rush in with half a clip and don't finish off the target with your initial assault.
Precision rifle - At present the Precision rifle feels to me just like a more powerful assault rifle (without the burst mode) in that you can still run your rifleman around and have time to fire at any discovered threats. So, I wanted it to feel more like a dedicated marksman's weapon which requires planning and careful aim to use, but is devastating when you line up a shot. He shouldn't be at the front of an advance, that's the Assault rifle and shotgunner's job. So I made the following changes to fit the Precision Rifle into a support role:
Reduce the ammo count to 5 rounds (to encourage some reloading and to make you pick your shots more carefully)
Increase the weapon weight and ammo weight a little
Removed the first two shot options. Have two shot options as follows: 1) 35 AP - 110% accuracy 2) 50AP - 130% accuracy
As I say, this is purely how I want to play the game and other people may disagree with everything I've just written! But, it sounded similar to what you were suggesting, so I recommend you open up the weapons.xml and weapons_gc.xml files and have a play around! (Save a backup if you do though, just in case!)
Oh, one more thing; I tell you what made the most difference for my enjoyment of the game - increasing sight ranges. I've set aliens up to 20 and my troops up to 18 and the difference ingame is very noticable. Shots flying in at your troops from well within the darkness makes for some exciting missions.
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Ironman mode makes the game much better, in my opinion. There's very rarely a situation that's going to completely end your game, and ending up with situations such as having to go out on a vital mission with 5 new rookies because you've just lost your chopper full of veterans adds an extra layer of tension to the game for me.
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The hidden movement camera is loads better, but I've still had one or two instances of the camera failing to follow the projectile on a killing shot. This was a shot made by my trooper. I saw him fire and then the alien death sound effect seemed to play almost simultaneously with the gunfire sound effect. I know this is still a work in progress but I thought I'd just point that out as most of the reports about this issue so far seem to be with the camera not following the AI units.
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On each crash site I've done for a Light Scout on the industrial tileset, there's been a dead Sebillian lying out in the middle of the street from the start of the mission. Is this a new feature, vigilante justice, as he's often got a group of civilians milling about him.
It seems as if he's classed as one of the numbered aliens you should expect to encounter on the mission, as each time I've only had to kill one live alien for the mission to end.
I've not yet played on the farm tileset, or with a Scout crashsite, so I'm not sure if this will occur in those situations too.
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Since the update this morning, I'm yet to have either a light scout or a scout fight my interceptors. Instead, they always retreat away. I've been sending a lone interceptor out against them too, and they still run a mile.
I've checked the files to make sure they had weapons, which they do, although their 'normal' weapons loadout is listed as 0 while their heavy weapons listing is 4. I've changed the normal loadout to 1 (or 2 for fighters) but this hasn't made any difference. Their bravery rating in the gameconfig.xml file is still listed as 0.1 which, as I understand it, should mean they're no more cowardly than in previous versions.
Add fighters to the list of cowards too...
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Sounds great! That's my bank holiday Monday sorted then...
Potential Geo-political Mod
in Modding Discussion
Posted
Well, here's what I'm currently using: (I've not listed the Pistol, Machine Gun or Rocket Launcher as I've not made any meaningful changes to those)
<Weapon name="weapon.rifle"
range="18" hands="2" recoil="0" weight="5" clipSize="30" reloadAPCost="15" reactionModifier="1.0"/>
<Set1 ap="15" accuracy="75" />
<Set2 ap="20" accuracy="85" />
<Set3 ap="27" accuracy="110" />
<BurstFire ap="25" accuracy="85" shotCount="3" />
damage="25" mitigation="12">
<Weapon name="weapon.rifleak”
range="18" hands="2" recoil="0" weight="5" clipSize="30" reloadAPCost="15" reactionModifier="1.0"/>
<Set1 ap="17" accuracy="70" />
<Set2 ap="20" accuracy="80" />
<Set3 ap="25" accuracy="95" />
</SingleShot>
<BurstFire ap="15" accuracy="70" shotCount="3" />
damage="35" mitigation="15">
<Weapon name="weapon.shotgun"
range="8" hands="2" recoil="0" weight="5" clipSize="8" reloadAPCost="15" reactionModifier="1.4"/>
<Set1 ap="16" accuracy="83" />
<Set2 ap="19" accuracy="90" />
damage="40" mitigation="20">
<Weapon name="weapon.sniper"
range="30" hands="2" recoil="0" weight="6.5" clipSize="5" reloadAPCost="15" reactionModifier="0.8">
<Set1 ap="35" accuracy="95" />
<Set2 ap="50" accuracy="130" />
damage="45" mitigation="25">
<Weapon name="weapon.rpg"
<props range="40" hands="2" recoil="65" weight="6" clipSize="1" reloadAPCost="99" reactionModifier="0.5"/>
<Set1 ap="24" accuracy="60" />
<Set2 ap="30" accuracy="75" />
damage="80" stunDamage="90" mitigation="0">
The main changes are the ammo count for the shotgun and the sniper rifle, and obviously the introduction of the AK47 and the RPG7. The tweaks to the main rifle have increased it's accuracy a little on all shot types, to give it the edge over the AK in that regard. The AK however has higher damage and armour mitigation and a lower AP cost on auto fire. So, if you like to gamble the AK has the highest damage potential, but you have to hit your target first.
The main things to notice about the RPG7 are the weight, which is half that of the rocket launcher, and the reload time, which is set to 99. Basically, I want the RPG to be a 1 shot, backup explosive weapon. It's outperformed across the board by the rocket launcher, but it can be carried in addition to wearing armour and carrying a rifle type weapon, as long as your soldier's fairly strong. It's pretty inaccurate, but it can provide explosive power in a pinch.
My next thoughts are about the difference between 'damage' and 'mitigation' and how I can use that to further define each weapon's role. This is going to depend largely on the balance of the aliens but to give an example in the current build; Sebillians are all about brute strength and being able to heal damage. So, I'm thinking of tweaking them so that they don't really have any armour to speak of, but they do have a high pool of HP.
On the other hand, the Caesans will rely more on armour for protection, but if you crack that, they're fairly fragile physically.
What this means is that I can set the shotgun to do a high amount of damage, but low armour mitigation, so it would be great for dealing with Sebillians, but not as effective against armoured targets. The AK, with it's close range burst fire can then have a higher mitigation stat, while not dealing as much physical damage, so that's your best bet for armoured enemies up close. This will hopefully provide different options even when weapons have similar roles, and will allow the player an extra level of planning.