Emily_F

I definitely like the decoys idea (though they should be a tech tree thing that you have to research for different kinds of enemy weapon). It would also be good to have cloaking tech once you have the stealth armour. Similarly, it would be good to be able to research things equivalent to the modules for soldiers (like advanced targeting, better radar allowing multiple target engagement at once, cybernetic integration that improves certain stats, maybe drones that have extra cannons or something). Pilot experience should absolutely be a thing - and I would love to see a "rescue mission" to recover the pilot (which could be a timed mission to get to them with a medikit within a certain number of turns, defended by cleaners who are looking for them to kill/abduct them). Would that be a possibility @Chris? I think pilots should be assignable and hireable, like the soldiers are. So you could assign good pilots to your best fighters for the best chances of winning battles. Experienced pilots would get perks like more evasive manoeuvres (or quicker recovery from the last one), able to go faster, as well as maybe a general "less chance to be hit" and higher "chance to land a hit" perk to stats. Finally, I think that it would be good to have multiple levels, with the lower levels having terrain that you could "hide" behind. That is probably a bit too hard to do, but it would make the air combat a bit more interesting - I find it a bit of a bore at the moment so almost always go with autoresolve.

I think there's meant to be pros and cons to the accelerated vs laser weapons. The laser machine gun is more powerful but doesn't hit the broad side of a barn. But the differentiation between the two types isn't clear (you can compare stats, but I've never wrapped my head around what the difference is between them)

That's a good point but it doesn't explain how the penetration makes a difference

You can. Right click on them in the drop ship view in the aircraft menu

Exactly. It's a fire support weapon to keep the enemy's head down while the assault fire team crawl up on their belt buckles to deliver some L109-shaped good news. As an aside I learned recently that they've binned the crow cannon off. But that the SA80 A3 is Gucci kit and even doesn't get cases stuck in the ejection chamber every third round the minute it's over 25°C, there is a speck of dust kicking around or right at the moment you're trying to breach a building. And that's assuming the magazine didn't fall out.

@Skitso Given the images of the maps you showed in the OP, I think Goldhawk should employ you as THE map designer. You obviously know what you're doing and it would take a big dev headache off their plate!!

Large weapons like sniper rifles and heavy guns are not meant to be fired from a standing position. I know I lost the argument back around V17 about introducing the prone position to increase accuracy and make troops harder to hit (I still think that combat missions would be much better if it was so, but hey ho!), but I really think that these weapons should have an accuracy penalty if not fired from a crouch. I think the sniper rifle should also have a reaction penalty (with pistols having a reaction effect bonus) especially at short range. One does not simply take pot-shots with, for example, an L115A3 because it has a long barrel and weighs a ton (making it hard to bring it to bear on a target in a hurry), and has a girt big scope on top that is useless at short range. Similarly, a Gimpy is not amenable to quickfire use. So ain't no alien getting a quick cap in his scaly green ass! I think these kind of changes that will put some clear water between different weapon systems and will make more of a difference to how you use/equip troops for a mission. And give some variation to combat missions - you will have to do a bit more thinking. That's my tuppence-worth anyway. What do other people think, especially those who have recently joined the tester community?

Yeah, that is kinda what I originally thought would suffice and would fix the issue in a way that keeps everyone happy lol

I just took down a medium UFO in the US with Phantoms from Africa and was on my way back to base, and had a random CTD. Edit: can confirm it is repeatable. If it makes a difference, I took the $200k rather than sent a dropship after downing it. It crashes as the fighter group get about 2/3 of the way back to base. Edit 2: If I take out the two fighters that turn up then it doesn't crash (see manual save) output.log auto_strategy_before_intercept-106.json user_will_it_still_crash-14.json

Ohhh, as in arrange them in the dropship in the grid. For example I put 2 snipers and a MARS at the tailgate and a heavy on either side door, and spread everyone else out accordingly. See what I mean? And @Chthon is right - I've been a tester since before Jesus was born, and until literally today I'd always thought that once a dropship was airborne you couldn't change anything. That said, it certainly isn't obvious and would be better if it was done after you've done the "equip your troops" screen - that is just logical UI.

Wait, what? How??? I didn't know that, but I was referring to what happens when you click on a downed UFO or base etc, and you choose to send the dropship, then you get taken to the load out screen to make any changes to the troops. It would be best if, after that screen, you could arrange the troops in the dropship.

Random CTD whilst trying to equip gauss rifle. The autosave attached is the last save I have and probably won't be any use, but the log prob will be. output.log auto_strategy_after_intercept-68.json

So, it is useful to be able to arm troops before going on the combat mission, but if you change loadouts you usually want to change people are on the drop ship, meaning you have to abort the launch to do so. It would be better to have arranging them after the load out screen when sending a dropship somewhere.

Yeah, thanks for adding this one. I kept meaning to do it and forgetting lol

All shots went in the right direction, nothing hit the side. Yeah at least one shot hit the Sebby

It wasn't the Sebby taking the shot - it was the guy at the side door shooting at Sebby. Guy in pink circle was suppressed despite being inside the lander and miles away from the bullets. I've noticed it a few times since.

Been stuck there for about a month user_day_165_manual_save-15.json

If you go to engineering, start building something, then queue a blaster, then exit the screen, then go back in before it starts building the blaster and delete it from the queue, it doesn't give you the alloys back. user_disappearing_alloys-9.json

As you can see in the screenshot below, solider in pink circle got suppressed by fire that was no where near him. This has to be a bug. w, the output.log auto_strategy_before_combat-7.json

I followed the instructions but it gave me this

@Skitso Tell us how you really feel!

@Chris as a related find - I have had several instances where I throw a grenade over a wall like in those screenshots, labelled as a 100% chance to hit, and it just lands at the soldier's feet. It seems to affect base missions only as far as I can recall.

The words are equivalent in my mind, but I guess it is subjective. In either case, I wouldn't expect it to necessarily affect the difficulty of the game any more than any research item. That might just be the way I interpret it though. You could add a statement that it won't affect the difficulty, but that seems superfluous to me because I expect the game to get harder over time and you don't know when that is going to happen anyway.

I am definitely keen on proximity grenades. And a nice touch would be directional (Claymore) ones.

I don't know if it was deliberate as part of the balancing but there was a flurry of tough missions around 90-120 days, then it fell off a cliff. I had a few UFO waves but no terror missions if I recall correctly (not that I'm complaining lol!). I will make more of a note of what missions happen when next time I have a playthrough