Rhishisikk

Or if there were actual light switches in the buildings. Second on the ability to refit/mod weapons. Give the engineers something to do between big projects. Or just let the soldiers do it themselves with a pool of "mod points" based on XP and research. Or an Armory building specifically for weapons tweaking, building, and research.

I like the idea that soldiers who engage in missions against the aliens can come down with diseases (as well as wounds). The idea of research in the bio-sciences makes my brain all tingly. Other traits (off the top of my head): - Survivor's Guilt from high-casualty missions. - Walking Dead for troops that have just been revived too many times. - Strong Heart and Weak Heart that affect the chance to be revived. - Jaded: Too many high casualty missions, the soldier no longer suffers morale penalties from other soldiers dying. - Psychic: The soldier is a conduit for mental energy, and thus easier to affect with Psionics. - Civilian: The soldier has an X% chance each round to be doing "other stuff", and not able to act (or Suppresses themselves).

Alternate reasons for slow alien growth: - The harvesting missions produce raw bio-products that have to be refined into products to wake up and feed your crews. - Everything is being brought back online after the most recent jump. - The alien leaders are waking from cryosleep and can only control so many missions per month. - Resources from the asteroid belt are generated slowly; only from earth missions are the needed elements readily available. - Alien leaders are too busy binge-watching Earth TV to make reasonable decisions about how to invade Earth.

I would say: Point 1: Maybe researches that permit increased stats, or only if nations really like you do they offer their prime soldiery? Or different pools, with different costs. Maybe mercenaries who are effective, but cost you political hatred of nations they've committed war crimes against? Maybe the soldiers can be "sent to training camp" for a fee and come back next month with slightly improved stats? This also largely (2) keeps them alive and (3) clears the slot for a new soldier. It also (partially) provides a mechanic for training soldiers out of combat addressed in other threads. Point 2: You think those men and women have nothing better to do than sit and wait for you? The nations of the WORLD are competing to hire competent soldiery, who, incidentally, are dying by the scores if not hundreds. You want them there for more than a month? Pay them a retainer fee, and hope they don't die doing side jobs with the world's military. Point 3: I heartily second an expanding list with technology/national support. Maybe an increased cost to hire to a base from other than local soldiery? Maybe each soldier "rejected" decreases that nation's enthusiasm for XNO (Xenonaut Organization) by a small amount?

UFO: AI runs a plotline similar to this. PHALANX (their Xenonauts) is a UN organization. Why aren't you better funded? Because each nation spends the bulk of its resources defending itself. Gain that nation's trust, and you'll get better funding (A series of ally/adversary relationships means if you are seen selling too much alien tech to one power, other powers will hate you.) Balancing your efforts between the major powers, minor powers, and "third world" (more to prevent them from seeking alien assistance) is its own minigame, and you might just have to face that saving everyone just isn't practical or even possible. The bones of such a mapping are easy enough to work out, especially if we keep to the cold war time period (where such things are recorded, as well as say, which nations want food or industrial works or such). Why are you limited to so few soldiers? Because A) each nation tends to keep its best and brightest and B) they have to pass through clearance of several nations to get to your recruiting desk. (This also means that personnel, not just money, is a potential reward from grateful nations.) Maybe the nations themselves aren't doing so hot. Plagued by internal rebels armed with alien equipment, rumors of leadership under mental domination, industrial cities laid to ruin (or undergoing costly repairs) - maybe they aren't collecting as many taxes as they're used to. Combine this with the need to house refugees, maybe treat victims of alien viruses, and otherwise keep things together in a war where anywhere can become a battlefront with only a few hours notice, and it's a miracle there's any kind of cooperation at all. I like the idea of a Xenonauts where there has to be a decision between how much to spend on military, how much on diplomacy, and how much on repairing and eventually improving the world you're fighting to save. One of your early-game goals could even be getting enough worldwide acknowledgement to legally operate globally under a UN charter (maybe you only get personnel and funding from your founding nations until this goal is reached). If XNO (Xenonaut Organization) was primarily founded by collusion between the US and USSR, particular opponents could be China, Turkey/Arab Nations, African nations, and I can even see a case for Europe to be hot under the collar. Instead of a DEFCOM tracker (or maybe in addition to), maybe you can only execute night missions or send smaller teams into nations that don't support you. Maybe you can't enter their airspace, or (worse) have to fight border aircraft. Maybe a nation will let you shoot down alien craft freely, but they lay full claim to the alien craft once its on the ground. Initial proposal - Hatred: The nation actively opposes XNO operations in their territory, and maybe in their neighbors as well - Dislike: They will allow you to cross over their airspace, but not engage in hostilities and bring down alien attention upon them. - Reluctance: You may conduct air operations, but not ground operations. - Neutral: You have the standard option of letting the nation send in ground forces, and they keep the tech but compensate you for it in money. And haven't gotten into the various stages of "we like you" and what you gain. Again, you should have less able covert aircraft. Maybe even ability to engage with normal aircraft, but only during night-time hours. Oh, and a proposal for out-of-base facilities: Maybe cities require food, which explains why early alien missions focus on farmland. You have to support the cities, because those are the major sources of monetary income for a nation. If they can't afford to fund XNO, then you're in trouble. You also want friendly cities because as your tech advances, those are places where you can put factories, or hospitals to treat the alien plagues, or even extra research centers (for the free autopsy techs, for example). Maybe the noncombat training proposed in another thread requires the resources of a full military base (found only in major cities). Maybe different nations/bases specialize in different attributes, skills, or special training. Universities for producing and training scientists. Radar stations, aircraft refueling bases, SAM sites, and so on. Maybe ocean salvage is only possible within a certain range of a port city. Which begs the question of an XNO navy to go out and GET those lost alien craft. But maybe the aliens can survive for a limited time underwater... Or maybe the aliens have amphibious and aquatic races as well...

I like the idea of customization choices; they could be saved like soldier default gear. It would also allow for vehicle and aircraft customization - speed vs armor vs weapons vs cargo vs techtoys. And this opens the field for soldier upgrades (bionics, alien dna, hybrid earth animal organs, whatever). We see in XN1 a vet with a cyberlimb - what if xenonauts sometimes lost those limbs, and went to a retirement home until we have the prosthetics to field them again? Warning: if based on Andron technology, expect the Androns to know where those soldiers are - at least until Research realizes their "oops" and allows for alternate (potentially less powerful) augmentations. Ooh, and what if such surgeries were NOT guaranteed to succeed? Surgery, especially early game, could be more dangerous than sending your soldier into combat. The prep time, the risk, the recovery time - is it really worth it? What if some technologies that improve odds/reduce damage are learned only by doing? Is a 10% more likely to revive fallen soldiers worth getting the nickname "The Butcher"?

It would be interesting to see general status, and then have to run diplomacy missions (or discover non-combat techs) to improve your intel. I wholeheartedly agree with being able to train non-combat troops. It shouldn't be anywhere near as fast or reliable as actual combat experience, but it should be possible. It would be nice to have "early armors" such as a firefighter's suit that wasn't entirely useless against plasma, but barely worth the TU lost. Also, if Sebillians are getting resurrection, I want their research tree to lead to an increased threshold/chance of reviving your fallen soldiers. I've also noticed I'm starting to ramble. But one last thought, I wouldn't mind if the lines between scientist, technician, and soldier were to get a bit blurred.

I feel that last-minute intel would require dropship inventory so your soldiers could re-equip. I know if the intel came early enough, it would determine which dropship I send. I'm not sending rookies to any missions with "Reapers spotted", for example. But if we're going with early reports, then we need a dynamic array to store roles. (I am NOT manually going over every soldier prior to every mission, even at the risk of losing a few missions) Actually, I'd really like it if we could have teams. Reaction-Fire team, sniper team, breaching team, etc. and then assign the teams to bases, dropships, city garrison (raise morale and quick reaction to terror raids)

I would further propose "legendary" events that cause the soldier to be more "morale valuable", such as: Exhausted all 100 points of healing from an advanced medpack. Killed five or more aliens in a single mission. Has survived multiple "Crimson Heart" awards. Led X number of missions where zero Xenonauts died.

I like this idea. What I REALLY like about this idea is that it suggests a reason for sending medical guys without superior gun skills (maybe even properly skilled scientist personnel) into the field with your "core soldiers". Or - taking a soldier off the line for a month or so to learn field medic skills. (One of several "skill trainings" that should be available.) But it also leads to the idea of more than just a basic and an advanced medical pack. (And maybe an emergency defibrilator (sp?) in the dropship.)

I like the idea of radar stations and SAM sites that aren't full bases. I can see the aliens deciding they just don't like those sites and targetting them. Do you send in only your fast craft, and get to the site before it is disabled or destroyed? Or do you risk the site to make sure more planes are involved in the fight? But if they scale up the air war, are they scaling up the ground war also? Will their be "save this military unit that's gotten in over their head" missions? Missions where we send "leaders" to assist the troops in a massive human-on-alien ground battle? Sorry, back to main topic. Several things have been proposed, and many of them are contradictory. I'm going to sit on my hands for now and try to speculate as little as possible. But XN2 has the bones to be awesome.

Things I would propose to counter the "humans aren't psychic" imbalance. 1) Mental discipline center, a place to train your soldiers to better resist psychic attacks. 2) Psi scrambler: Requires the power source of the dropship, but interferes with psi effects within a certain radius. 3) Anti-psi helmets, for some measure of protection. And I'm going to disagree with the "it's a counter to juggernauting" argument. By the time you have both the research and the materials to Juggernaut, you've earned a mission or two before the aliens deploy counter-armor weapons.