[Mind war is overpowered]

Yes, I'm referring to software errors. In my latest run, one of my fighter craft won't replace and I'm pretty sure it's why I can't do ground sites (it's Beta - waddaya gonna do?). Eh, so it looks as much like weight of numbers are causing problems. I guess that having a hard cap of 2 aliens which can use the squadsight (I'm pretty sure that the current version of Mind War is squadsight) version of Mind War would help, and possibly transferring the Mindshield as an armour module would be good - of course, I guess if the mindshild is an armour module then you wouldn't be able to have things like the tac visor or the rebreather.

 

How about this as a suggestion - have two versions of the Mindshield? One version which is an armour module only affects the wearer of the armour. And you have another version which is its big brother, goes in the secondary slot and has an AOE, so you can designate some soldiers as umbrellas. Perhaps a 6x6 or 7x7 radius?   

[Mind war is overpowered]

I've never been able to get past March, the weight of bugs seems to always drag me down, but I've got to say I've never had a real issue when Mind War was used in Raids and Terror sites. Seeing as I have a full turn before a mind-warr'd soldier is affected, I drop that soldier's gun and have him crouch in position. As there's never - to me at least - any more that two soldiers affected at any time by Mind War I can't see the problem other people are having?

[Is it the end of beta content?]

Well, I think you've probably reached the end of available content. Operation: ENDGAME is in theory the final mission, with a custom map and all, so if you can't get that, it's because Chrs hasn't designed it yet!

[Why was the Foxtrot removed?]

Just a friendly reminder folks. You attack the argument, not the person. Or I lock this thread. Tara for now!

[Air combat - what's wrong with it?]

Seeing as the X2 air combat is currently almost exactly the same as the X1 air combat, I can see how people would be dissastisfied with it. The esstial thrust of air combat in X2 is either:

1) Run straight at your opponent 

or

2) If you have more than 1 aircraft, kite your opponent into revealing the section of UFO that is uncovered by weapons and start shooting

I spent quite a lot of time making air combat more interesting in X1, resulting in three generations of Flying Circuses, and I'm sure Charon can recount his experiences of changing up air combat for X-Division. In my case, what I aimed to do was create an interesting puzzle to crack. Each new UFO presented a different type of challenge. Perhaps it fired swarms of micro missiles. Perhaps you had to fly between multiple turrets. Not all my creations were successful. I think that if X2's air combat is to be more fun, it needs to create new problems of positioning. The rotating turret and energy shield are a good start but there's a lot more that I feel could be done.

 

Firstly, I think that Goldhawk should steal Steambird's control mechanism for aircraft. The mechanism that the original Steambirds uses is an excellent fit for X2's air combat. You can see the turning curve for your aircraft and plan for where it's going to end up without constantly hitting the pause button every few seconds. When the aircraft reaches the end point of its planned movement, that's when you can set up the next plan. I can see this being useful for also setting up and controlling multiple aircraft at once, as you could bandbox aircraft together and set them all by the same plan. 

 

Secondly, I think Goldhawk should take a leaf from shmups, specifically the boss fights in shmups. As frantic as Boss fight shmups are, they are all about positioning and that's made possible through the wide range of projectile types that bosses have. As things currently stand, UFOs have two types of projectile - homing and non-homing. There's no continious beams, no aerial mines, no splitters. no swarmers. There's no telegraphing, no wind-up, no obvious lock-on. I'd like to see more projectile types that encourage positioning, because, at the moment, they don't, really. 

[[v12.2 Strategy] Crash on commencing Destroyer map]

On trying to commence combat on a specific Destroyer Borealis Logging map, the game crashes. 

Savegame (warning - takes forever to load): auto_strategy_before_combat-69.json

[[V12.2 - Crash on loading saved combat game]]

Here are some more 99%'ers in case there are similarities between problem savegames which could help tracking the issue down

Terror Mission: user-20.json

Observer crash Mission: user-9.json

[[v12.2 Strategy] If Interceptor Lasers are built, the game crashes]

If I construct Interceptor lasers, the game freezes then crashes.

Savegame (3 game hours before final construction): auto_strategy_after_intercept-68.json

[[v12.2 Ground Combat] Can't transfer items on ground to belt or backpack]

Sgm. Buck Reed was Mind Warr'd, paniced and dropped all his kit. When trying to get it back I could transfer the LMG and med pack back to their proper places, but not the ammo to the belt or the backpack:

 

Savegame (Reed has full AP at this point):  user-18.json

Pic:

 

: 

[[v12.2 Strategy] Impossible to click on alien fighter symbol]

I can't click on any alien fightercraft that have been detected.

Savegame: user-7.json

[How many bases do you build?]

Can't comment on that - only got as far as March/April.

[[v12.2 Ground Combat] Mind War flag no taken off if interrupted]

If a soldier is affected by Mind War, but you kill the Psyon before the soldier can take their turn as an enemy. the Mind War flag on the UI will stay throughout the rest of the battle. 

Savegame:   user-5.json

 

 

[How many bases do you build?]

As far as interceptor bases go, I add one more to fully cover australia and move the other base a little further up. Given the shortage of scientists and engineers, there doesn't seem like there's a need to create a dedicated factory or a research complex - you can add those on to either the main base or as extensions of the satellite bases as needed. 

[Any way to manage gender of new soldiers in the config? (Solved!)]

....

 

I've seen this particular discussion way too many times during the development of X1. It never ended well. Rusknight has established that if you want an all female or all male crew, you can do that and shows you how to do it. Please, can the discussion end there. 

[Any way to manage gender of new soldiers in the config? (Solved!)]

That's the pioneering spirit I like to see! 

 

EDIT: Perhaps you might have to edit the regiment field as well? It might be that the two are tied together. 

[Maps]

All the maps I've seen are static, but based on comments Chris has made in the past, the underlying structure is intended to be semi-random submaps. As I understand it, Goldhawk's map creation tool uses licenced properties so they can't release it for general consumption so I can't say more than that. 

As far as alien varieties go, do you mean more alien types, or more alien sub-types within the types we've seen? 

[Community Discussion - how best to handle equipping soldiers not in dropships?]

This probably more true than ever with X2. The add-on modules for armour mean there's a lot more options and as a consequence more room for new loadouts. When it comes to modding, I imagine the first thing modders will do is add 20+ modules per armour set!

[Any way to manage gender of new soldiers in the config? (Solved!)]

Well, it's looks like you've levelled up, Rusknight. Could you check to make sure you can have an all female crew,please, and tell us about any experiments with adjusting the ratios. 

[Community Discussion - how best to handle equipping soldiers not in dropships?]

I like Option Charon. If XCE already does what Charon describes, then I'd like to see that in X2. 

[Any way to manage gender of new soldiers in the config? (Solved!)]

You might want to play about with combatant.json in /steamapps/common/Xenonauts 2/assets/assets/template/strategy/masters/actor/combatant. (phew, that was a long one!). I'm mid testing a theorem of mine, so I can't fiddle with it myself, but have a look at that file, you might find what you want. 

[[V12.2] Game will not start]

One thing that's worked for me in the past is to uninstall the game, then go into where the xenonauts 2 directory is stored in Steam (this is for me /steam/steamapps/common/xenonauts 2/ and delete that. Also, go to where your saved games are stored (again, for me this is /documents/my saved games/Xenonauts 2) and delete that as well, so there's absolutely no evidence what-so-ever of Xenonauts 2 on your PC, then re-install. 

[Idea: Conceal Mechanic]

If you proceed along that route, then in terms of game mechanics you see-saw between a mechanic being OP, and a mechanic being utterly useless, the periods of usefulness and uselessness being as long as the designers see fit. I'd prefer a mechanic that I can use consistently throughout the lifespan of the game. 

[Idea: Conceal Mechanic]

Regarding camouflage: it's an interesting concept, but I can see it being horribly abused. As Charon so rightly notes, LOS is more important than cover so switching everyone to camo as soon as possible would be the obvious choice. If the counter to camouflage is to produce abilities that neutralise camouflage then the counter to that would be to kill any neutralising agents first then you have free reign of the map. I think if something like camouflage were to work, it would have to be unstable, in a similar way to the way that Reapers' camouflage in XCOM2 is unstable so you can't consistently be camouflaged. 

[limitation of M.A.R.S. and A.R.E.S.]

Needs more Dakka? 

[limitation of M.A.R.S. and A.R.E.S.]

When the MARS was first introduced, it became clear pretty quickly that the MARS was a bit OP when deployed in multiples, especially when people sang the praises of the MARS and told stories of how their 4-team of MARS roflstomped the opposition. So now it's a hard cap of 1. You get a juicy bit of tech on the field without facerolling the aliens.