PALU

Being literal at least partially comes from a lack of understanding of the overall perspective. If you don't have a sufficient grasp of it you're reduced to describe the parts, and if you don't know which parts are important, you don't know what you can leave out safely. Quote: Yes, I understood that, and responded to it. However, it doesn't matter, as I've reworded it: Ground Combat Well, we're back with our boots in the dirt again, Commander. Our latest field reports say that half of the regular damage has the same impact on aliens' neural system as well, and on our soldiers too. Close range weapons like shotguns which have additional stun damage features should be able to almost fully stun a target. Although I would say it dies before that, so a stun weapon of choice will still be necessary for the last part. Our melee weapons will be a special treat because a trained soldier will almost always be able to bypass or break through the armour, but against the hardest of targets. Also note that melee attacks are able to work around shields, thus ignoring their effects, and this is valid regardless of whether the attacker is our soldier or an alien unit. Also, if your men think they can unconsciously sleep through a mission you should wake them up with some special adrenaline packs which you will find in the medipack. And when we're on the subject of battlefield conditions, it's time to bring up the subject of morale. The regular stress of terror and confusion in combat is bad enough, but when you bring in psychic attacks things can go downhill quickly. Our soldiers' base morale level can improve through various kinds of combat experience, and the higher it is when disembarking in the battlefield, the more stress the soldier can withstand before sinking to a dangerously low level, so every piece of hard won morale, also called bravery, is valuable. A universal battlefield experience (at least for humans) is that having buddies at your back provides a morale safety net, so the two soldiers with the highest rank within 10 tiles of a soldier bolsters the morale of the soldier through the comfort of having support at hand, and the more experienced the support is, the more comfort is provided. Knowing that you're led by a capable leader provides comfort that results in an improved starting morale at the start of the battle, while the worry of having to baby sit privates will reduce the leader's ability to provide support, and thus reduces the ability provide a bonus. Various battlefield experiences whittle away at the effective morale, although there are a few that are positive, but generally stress will grind morale down during the battle, although the buddy safety net will not be lost (unless the buddies are lost or too far away to lend support), so buddy support provided at the beginning of one turn may change to the beginning of the next one, depending of how units move (or die), but moving back into support range will regain the buddy support lost. Psionic attacks are particularly potent at reducing morale, but death of humans, civilians in particular, shakes the morale. It's bad enough when deaths are caused by the aliens, but "friendly fire" deaths take an additional toll on the team in general and the soldier causing it in particular. Eliminating enemy units help up the morale, and it's even better if it's done by the team, with the highest boost going to the soldier eliminating the enemy. A soldier with a low morale may freeze in fear or free outright, and, rarely when the morale is extremely low, berserk, firing at a random (live or inanimate, friend or foe) target. There have been rumours of the aliens being able to induce berserking into soldiers, but as far as we have been able to determine, those rumours are incorrect. Recovering from a morale failure results in recovery of some lost morale.

"Provide" was intended to refer to "ability", so while I think it's technically correct, is easy to misunderstand. "while" is a mistyping of "whole".

New attempt and a couple of questions: - Does stunning an alien count as a kill, or do you miss out on the morale boos (as well as the kill count)? - Does "killing" a multi layered alien count as a kill each time, or only the last one? Ground Combat Well, we're back with our boots in the dirt again, Commander. Our latest field reports say that half of the regular damage has the same impact on aliens' neural system as well, and on our soldiers too. Close range weapons like shotguns which have additional stun damage features should be able to almost fully stun a target. Although I would say it dies before that, so a stun weapon of choice will still be necessary for the last part. Our melee weapons will be a special treat because a trained soldier will almost always be able to bypass or break through the armour, but against the hardest of targets. Also note that melee attacks are able to work around shields, thus ignoring their effects, and this is valid regardless of whether the attacker is our soldier or an alien unit. Also, if your men think they can unconsciously sleep through a mission you should wake them up with some special adrenaline packs which you will find in the medipack. And when we're on the subject of battlefield conditions, it's time to bring up the subject of morale. The regular stress of terror and confusion in combat is bad enough, but when you bring in psychic attacks things can go downhill quickly. Our soldiers' base morale level can improve through various kinds of combat experience, and the higher it is when disembarking in the battlefield, the more stress the soldier can withstand before sinking to a dangerously low level, so every piece of hard won morale, also called bravery, is valuable. A universal battlefield experience (at least for humans) is that having buddies at your back provides a morale safety net, so the two soldiers with the highest rank within 10 tiles of a soldier bolsters the morale of the soldier through the comfort of having support at hand, and the more experienced the support is, the more comfort is provided. Knowing that you're led by a capable leader provides comfort that results in an improved starting morale at the start of the battle, while the worry of having to baby sit privates will reduce the leader's ability to support, and thus provide a bonus. Various battlefield experiences whittle away at the effective morale, although there are a few that are positive, but generally stress will grind morale down during the battle, although the buddy safety net will not be lost (unless the buddies are lost or too far away to lend support), so buddy support provided at the beginning of one turn may change to the beginning of the next one, depending of how units move (or die), but moving back into support range will regain the buddy support lost. Psionic attacks are particularly potent at reducing morale, but death of soldiers affects everyone's morale, with loss of more experienced comrades in arms taking a higher toll, and losing a ground vehicle shakes the confidence as well. Failure to protect civilians by failing to protect them from aliens also takes a toll on the team, and accidentally killing a civilian even more so, in particular, of course, for the unlucky soldier doing it. Soldiers (or own vehicles) killed by fellow soldiers result in additional loss of morale to the team in general and the killer in particular. Wounding and suppressing fellow soldiers does not help up morale either, although suppression is not nearly as bad as injury, of course. On the positive side of things, aliens killed boosts the morale of the while team, and the one landing the killing blow even more so, and destroying alien vehicles is an even more potent morale booster than a unit, given how dangerous vehicles are. A soldier with a low morale may freeze in fear or free outright, and, rarely when the morale is extremely low, berserk, firing at a random (live or inanimate, friend or foe) target. There have been rumours of the aliens being able to induce berserking into soldiers, but as far as we have been able to determine, those rumours are incorrect. Recovering from a morale failure results in recovery of some lost morale.

Going through the file posted, I noted that ranks are listed only up to Colonel, but I believe Brigadier General and General are higher ranks than that. Shouldn't the complete set of ranks be listed?

An attempt to push it into Ground Combat, as I think that's the best place out of those I've looked at. I've cut out the chief scientist stuff to leave it neutral, as I don't think he's the right person to talk about battlefield condition. It could possibly be the guy who intercepted a report somewhere. Also note the unfinished ending. Ground Combat Well, we're back with our boots in the dirt again, Commander. Our latest field reports say that half of the regular damage has the same impact on aliens' neural system as well, and on our soldiers too. Close range weapons like shotguns which have additional stun damage features should be able to almost fully stun a target. Although I would say it dies before that, so a stun weapon of choice will still be necessary for the last part. Our melee weapons will be a special treat because a trained soldier will almost always be able to bypass or break through the armour, but against the hardest of targets. Just don't try to break an energy shield with it, that is pretty futile. If you have the time sneak around and attack the back. Also, if your men think they can unconsciously sleep through a mission you should wake them up with some special adrenaline packs which you will find in the medipack. And when we're on the subject of battlefield conditions, it's time to bring up the subject of morale. The regular stress of terror and confusion in combat is bad enough, but when you bring in psychic attacks things can go downhill quickly. Our soldiers' base morale level can improve through various kinds of combat experience, and the higher it is when disembarking in the battlefield, the more stress the soldier can withstand before sinking to a dangerously low level, so every piece of hard won morale, also called bravery, is valuable. A universal battlefield experience (at least for humans) is that having buddies at your back provides a morale safety net, so the two soldiers with the highest rank within 10 tiles of a soldier bolsters the morale of the soldier through the comfort of having support at hand, and the more experienced the support is, the more comfort is provided. Various battlefield experiences whittle away at the effective morale, although there are a few that are positive, but generally stress will grind morale down during the battle, although the buddy safety net will not be lost (unless the buddies are lost or too far away to lend support), so buddy support provided at the beginning of one turn may change to the beginning of the next one, depending of how units move (or die), but moving back into support range will regain the buddy support lost. Psionic attacks are particularly potent at reducing morale, but death of soldiers...<I don't know what the other positive/negative factors are beyond guesses>. Edit: Is the stuff about the energy shield and rear attack correct? It works perfectly well to attack a unit carrying a normal shield from the front, and it seems energy shields have a 360 degree coverage anyway (all the energy shielded unit's I've encountered so far have been mechanical, so it would be silly to try to stun them, and whiffle sticks are the only melee weapons I've had so far).

I don't *mind* but there are some issues: - It doesn't seem to be something that fits with research, but rather as a timed (or whatever it is) entry, such as the spy and scouting mission ones. I don't know how you'd make any such entry appear, although it's probably not difficult when you know how. I would also guess the time it's set to appear at would influence how it's written. "Translating" game mechanics into something that has some similarity to in game content might not be trivial, but it can be attempted. - My artistic ability stopped developing at around the stick figure stage, so any illustration would have to be made by someone who's competent. - I've seen the note on the morale, but that's about it, and know nothing about the Safety in Numbers thing, so I'd have to understand that first, in order to explain it. Edit: Read the Safety in Numbers patch note entry. What's "in range", i.e. how far, and is it geometric range or pathing range (and, if the latter, does a shield make things worse and flying ability better)? It doesn't say "visual" so I assume a buddy behind your back helps? Although it talks about "higher ranking officers" it doesn't seem to be related to a soldier's own rank, so I would guess a brigadier general would still be helped by a mere general nearby? It seems this would be an entry on Morale (I'll leave Moral for for politicians and spiritual leaders), and I certainly don't have the full knowledge of how that works.

Hm. Strange bug. I was doing a Phase 2 andron light cruiser mission, and when I had removed everything visible (3 shield replacements later) I entered the control room to find the last enemy, an andron boss (pinkish, with a force field). The odd thing is that the mission was declared successful when I removed the shield, and thus hadn't touched the unit yet, and there wasn't any andron remains other than soldiers in the spoils. I have a vague feeling something similar has happened to me earlier, possibly when destroying a terror andron: rather than it morphing into a dog box, I think the mission was declared successful. Thus, it seems "destruction" of the last unit which should cause it to morph just checks if the unit killed is the last one rather than perform that check after the destruction code has been run through (if so, it might also preserve civilians and spoils that would have been destroyed when a unit exploding on death is eliminated as the last one).

And some techno mumbo-jumbo that has very tenuous connections to real physics... Sonic Technology The aliens introduced the Alien Ion Technology, so we obviously studied it to see what we can learn from it. Then we went back to see what we can apply to our own weaponry. The result of that is the Sonic Technology, which has few surface similarities with the Alien Ion Technology, but nevertheless applies quite a few of the same technical solutions. Sonic Technology, isn't that trying to burst the enemies eardrums with very loud sounds? Well, it could be, but our "normal" Kinetic weapons are far superiour to what Kinetic damage we could hope to achieve with sound, so we apply it in quite a different manner. The "Sonic" in the technology name doesn't refer to the damage dealing part, but to a part of the delivery system. An old problem with energy weapons in their various incarnations is that the energy both gets deflected by being buffeted by air molecules on its path, and loses energy by heating those air molecules. What we want is to fire through vacuum, and that is sort of what we achieve with the Sonic Technology: a finely tuned pattern of constructive and destructive interference causes the air molecules to move sideways out of the way of the Plasma bolt following the sound wave. The sound parts the crowd, if you will (and, incidentally, when the air returns back to fill the void there is indeed a distinctive sound not dissimilar to thunder). You may have noted I mentioned a Plasma bolt, and yes, we are returning to the Plasma technology (with numerous refinements, of course), as we can cause it to move at the speed of sound, and thus stay in the bubble created by the sound wave, whereas light moves at, well, the speed of light (or, rather, the speed of light in air, but that doesn't make a difference here). Our improvements to the Plasma technology involves improved control of the bolt, including of the graviton's bolt cohesion effect, and removal of the interfering air has allowed us to pump more power into the plasma without it being destroyed by the changed properties of super heated air. However, we have some touch challenges in that the plasma bolt will have to match speed with the sound wave, and the speed of sound varies depending on air pressure, temperature, and humidity. While we devised sensors for weapon fitting that would make any pre war meteorologist drool, we still have severe issues to keep the plasma inside the vacuum bubble, and it doesn't help that whatever residual air that's there produces friction that slows the bolt. So, we have produced a technology that's barely working, and when it is, it has a very short range, so why would we ever try something like this? Well, it is a last ditch attempt to stop what at first was an annoying and somewhat dangerous enemy slowing us down, but which has grown to become an almost unstoppable rampaging menace. I'm talking about the Androns, of course. We need something that can blast them apart quickly, and if that means we have to send several soldiers to within touching distance to do so, we have to. As indicated, the technology is subject to several technical issues, which means the Mk-1 line may well be more underwhelming than usual. The upside is that we're very good at solving technical problems, and that means we have very high hopes that studies allowing us to incorporate Energy Cores into the design will result in a markedly improved Mk-2 line. This, of course, means it is vitally important to study first the more advanced alien Ion based weapons to get a better grasp of their functioning, and then immediatley on to applying that knowledge to our own weapons with Advanced Sonic Technology. We think the technology is sufficiently mature to design a vehicle mounted weapon based on it, as some of our technical issues stem from issues with miniaturisation. Despite the shortcomings of the Sonic Technology in its current state we think we may be able to combine it with studies in the corresponding Kinetic weapon field with studies of Alien Singularity Cores to produce an aircraft weapon.

Here are the rest of the Rail weapons: Rail SMG Mk-1 We're not really happy with this weapon, as it deals less damage than the Gauss SMG Mk-1, although the armour mitigation is better. The reason for this is that we have had some difficulties with getting a reasonable number of bullets into the burst. We will definitely work on that for the inevitable Mk-2 version. 12 Alien Alloys are required for the production of this weapon. Rail Rifle Mk-1 The Rail Rifle Mk-1 is a clear improvement over the Gauss Rifle Mk-1. It deals more damage than the Gauss Rifle Mk-2, but has a poorer armour mitigation. We require 12 Alien Alloys to produce this weapon. Rail Carbine Mk-1 The Rail Carbine Mk-1 is a clear improvement over the Gauss Shotgun Mk-1, although the ammo clip capacity is worse, and it even deals more damage than the Gauss Shotgun Mk-2, although it has only half the ammo clip capacity. We need 12 Alien Alloys for this weapon. Rail Sniper Mk-1 The Rail Sniper Mk-1 outperforms the Gauss Sniper Mk-1 on all fronts except the poor ammo clip capacity, and is a match for the Gauss Sniper Mk-2 with a higher damage and accuracy, but with a poorer armour mitigation, and, of course, a worse ammo clip capacity. You have to provide us with 18 Alien Alloys to get one of these weapons. Rail Heavy Mk-1 The Rail Heavy Mk-1 is superiour to the Gauss Heavy Mk-1 on all fronts except ammo clip capacity, but fares poorly when pitted against the Gauss Heavy Mk-2 due to the latter's better armour mitigation. Production of this weapon consumes 12 Alien Alloys. Rail Minigun Mk-1 A comparison of the Rail Minigun Mk-1 and the Gauss Minigun Mk-1 results in a clear win for the former. When pitted again a Gauss Minigun Mk-2 it's a matter of higher damage versus higher armour mitigation, though. Construction of a Rail Minigun Mk-1 requires a whopping 36 Alenium Alloys. Rail Pistol Mk-2 It's considerably better than the Mk-1 on all fronts. The snap shot is almost as accurate as the aimed shot of the Mk-1 version. We need 8 Ballistic Cores and 8 Alien Alloys to be able to produce this weapon. Rail SMG Mk-2 I think we have redeemed ourselves with the Rail SMG Mk-2. It outperforms the Mk-1 on all fronts, dealing twice the damage even before taking the better armour mitigation into account. Construction of this weapon requires 10 Ballistic Cores and 8 Alien Alloys. Rail Rifle Mk-2 The Rail Rifle Mk-2 is much better than the Mk-1, where everything as been improved. 8 Ballistic Cores and 8 Alien Alloys are required for this weapon. Rail Carbine Mk-2 2 additional pellets per shot, higher accuracy, and a larger ammo clip capacity makes the Rail Carbine Mk-1 obsolete. The Rail Carbine Mk-2 requires 8 Ballistic Cores and 8 Alien Alloys to be manufactured. Rail Sniper Mk-2 The Rail Sniper Mk-1 is left behind in the dust by the Rail Sniper Mk-2, with the latter weapon's ability to hit an enemy in the next county with precision and lethality. The weak point is the ammo clip capacity that more or less demand a kill with every bullet. Creation of this stand off killer need 10 Ballistic Cores and 8 Alien Alloys. Rail Heavy Mk-2 You still get only 4 burst from an ammo clip with the Rail Heavy Mk-2, but that burst contains an additional bullet compared to the Mk-1 model, and in addition to this, the range, damage (per bullet), armour mitigation, and accuracy are improved as well. We need 8 Ballistic Cores and 8 Alien Alloys to be able to produce this weapon. Rail Minigun Mk-2 50% more bullets in the burst and each one of them doing more damage while mitigating more armour means the added range and larger ammo clip capacity (when the additional bullets have been accounted for) are just icing on the Mk-2 versus Mk-1 cake. I hope you have been hoarding Ballistic Cores, as you will need to provide 48 of them to get this weapon, so the 12 Alien Alloys that are required as well seems almost insignificant in comparison. Rail Pistol Mk-3 This retrofit provides you with a Rail Pistol with a longer range, larger ammo clip capacity, higher damage, and higher armour mitigation. This upgrade consumes 12 Ballistic Cores, 10 Alien Alloys, and 16 Alenium. Rail SMG Mk-3 We have continued to work on the burst bullet count issue, and have been able to add another one in this retrofit. This comes on top of improvements on all other fronts. Upgrading an SMG Mk-2 to Mk-3 status requires 15 Ballistic Cores, 10 Alien Alloys, and 16 Alenium. Rail Rifle Mk-3 The Mk-3 version of the Rail Rifle improves on the Mk-2 version on all fronts. The Mk-2 to Mk-3 upgrade consumes 12 Ballistic Cores, 10 Alien Alloys, and 16 Alenium. Rail Carbine Mk-3 Two additional pellets in the shot, longer range, and a larger ammo clip capacity are the key differences between the Mk-3 and Mk-2 versions of the Rail Carbine. An upgrade of a Rail Carbine Mk-2 involves 12 Ballistic Cores, 10 Alien Alloys, and 16 Alenium. Rail Sniper Mk-3 We still haven't been able to increase the ammo clip capacity for the Rail Sniper with the Mk-3 retrofit, but almost everything else has been improved: higher damage, a mighty armour mitigation, higher accuracy, and an improvement on what already was an impressive range. The Rail Sniper Mk-2 upgrade protocol includes 15 Ballistic Cores, 10 Alien Alloys, and 18 Alenium. Rail Heavy Mk-3 This retrofit increases the range of the weapon, and improves the accuracy, damage, armour mitigation, and, unfortunately, the weight of the weapon. This upgrade sets you back 12 Ballistic Cores, 10 Alien Alloys, and 18 Alenium. Rail Minigun Mk-3 This retrofit makes a heavy weapon even heavier, reaching 30 kg. However, you also get a lot of useful properties in the form of near sniper rifle range, more damage, higher armour mitigation, 33% more bullets per burst (resulting in twice the number of the Mk-1 could expel!), and an ammo clip capacity that more than compensates for the burst bullet count increase. We almost blush when we have to tell you the amount of material involved in this upgrade: 72 Ballistic Cores, 18 Alien Alloys, and 18 Alenium.

AV.RAILCANNON: Researches.AlienAlloyFabrication(AND)Researches.AlienSingularityCore(AND)Researches.RailTechnology and the other aircraft/vehicle/mech weapons requiring one of the two Rail Techs. Alien Alloy Fabrication is very low tech here, and Alien Alloy Hardening is reachable through phase 2 and has been required by earlier aircraft/vehicle weapons, if I remember correctly. An Advanced Alien Alloy Fabrication Technology, if one exists, might not be unreasonable either. I can't really see it for myself, at it will be quite some time before I get there. I can use what I indicated in my interpretation, so the comment wasn't a complaint, but rather a comment that I hadn't expected it. If I was to come up with something it would state that the Sonic part wasn't correct at all and there was no actual sound involved... Edit: I've tried to weave what's been described above into the human weapon tech descriptions (I didn't find anything to add to the MAG Tech, though): Division Technology The X Division has used the lessons learned from studies into Alien Ballistic Technology to devise our own improved ballistic weapons, which we call Division Technology. We still have scant knowledge of the strengths and weaknesses of the various alien species, although we have noted a significant tendency for Kinetic resistance, which means Kinetic Armour mitigation is likely to be important. As we're still fumbling very much in the dark, we have tried to apply the Division Technology in a broad range of directions in the hope that at least some of the weapons will be useful. It's up to you, Commander, to gather reports from the field and adapt your strategy to the findings and use the weapons that turn out to be effective. The theoretical and technological underpinning from our studies allows us to start the development of actual weapon systems: a ground vehicle mounted machinegun, a heavy machinegun for soldier use, and shotgun, rifle, and pistol versions, all improving on the standard ballistic weaponry. In addition to this, we have also laid the groundwork for the development of advanced research to produce additional ballistic weapon models. Laser Technology We've done it, Commander! We have finally developed the technology required to develop energy weapons of our own. Lasers as such are nothing new, of course. They have been known for decades, and has been described as a solution in search of a problem. Well, I think we definitely have a problem! The human pre war technology level has meant that lasers have been a lab curiosity without much use, as it requires a lot of power discharged rapidly, and ionisation of the air and the resultant opacity to the laser beams have resulted in lasers strong enough to cause any real damage to have a range measured in inches. Alenium has allowed us to start to get the energy capacity and discharge down to a man portable format, and our studies of Alien Phaser Technology has allowed us to work around the ionisation issue. This means that we can now start the research into the practical production processes of Laser Rifles, Laser Pistols, and ground Vehicle Pulse Lasers. To produce more advanced Laser weapons we need to perform further research, but we are have all we need to start it. Our knowledge of the various alien species and their strengths and weaknesses is scant, so instead of trying to guess what might work best against them, we have instead tried to build on the strengths inherent in the Laser Technology itself, which means a high precision. We are still working on the "ammo" clip energy discharge, so the actual energy amount inflicted on the target is lower than that of the ballistic weapon counterparts, and we also have a bit of a technical issue with ammo clip replacement (i.e. "reloading"), causing it to take longer than the mechanical counterpart. Armour mitigation is nothing to brag about, but we hope, based on the initial battlefield reports, that we may not need as much mitigation for Energy weapons as Kinetic one does. Plasma Technology We have finally cracked the Plasma nut, Commander. This research allows us to start researching Plasma Rifles and Plasma Pistols of our own design, as well as aircraft and ground vehicle borne systems. Plasma, as you may know, is the fourth energy state of matter (the other being solid, liquid, and gas). In a plasma atoms are stripped of at least some of their electrons, resulting it to have a positive charge. This, in turn, makes it possible to manipulate it with magnetic fields to shape it and propel it. Before we had access to any alien technology, plasma manipulation has mostly been a lab research activity, with any attempts to control high energy plasma resulting in magnetic field breakdown and the escape (and dissipation) of the plasma (this is a dominating reason fusion reactors have kept being 10 years away for decades). Alien materials and technology has changed this, and we are now able to shape and hurl bolts of high energy plasma at reasonably distant targets with an acceptable precision. It should be noted that the Plasma Technology isn't a straight upgrade of the Laser Technology, but rather a complement to it, as the two technologies have different characteristics. While both technologies deal Energy damage, the Laser weapon technology strengths are long range, high accuracy, high armour mitigation, and a large ammo clip capacity. Plasma weapons, on the other hand, excel at dealing out large amounts of damage. Thus, it's a matter of stand off finesse versus in-your-face brute force, smashing through armour (paving the way for further attacks, should any be necessary), if you will. It can also be noted that the Plasma Technology does not impart any inherent recoil to the weapons. It is not unlikely you will find different weapons in the arsenal more suitable for one technology than the other, with your overall battlefield tactics having a dominating influence on your loadout selections. Together with an understanding of how the Advanced Alien Plasma Technology works we should have all that's needed to start researching our own Advanced Plasma Technology. Gauss Technology We have made another breakthrough, Commander. After studying the alien Vindicator Technology, we have been able to use the technology to prepare the ground for the development of a new weapons technology series of our own, the Gauss Technology. The physics theory behind this line of weapons is well known, so our problems have been technical rather than theoretical, i.e. how to produce sufficiently strong magnetic fields without affecting the surroundings (you don't want nails to be pulled out of boards to come flying at the weapon, nor have the weapon pulled away towards e.g. a ground vehicle), and how to provide enough energy in the ammo clips and discharge that energy quickly enough. And, of course, the whole contraption would have to fit the general shape and weight, and function of a normal weapon. So, how does a Gauss weapon work? The basic principle is actually the same as that of the MAG Technology, but applied in a much more sensible fashion: a coil shaped electro magnet pulls a magnetic slug towards its center. As soon as the center is reached, the current is cut, and the bullet continues forward through the hole. A pistol would use a single coil, while a sniper rifle would use a series of coils such that the second coil is magnetised as the first one is disabled, pulling the bullet forward at ever increasing speeds. The overall aim for this weapon line is to allow the troops to keep a bit more distance between themselves and the enemy, this is particularly useful if the enemy tends to reaction fire when fired upon. The MAG Technology weapons do a good job at the burst front, so we'll concentrate on single bullet performance in the form of range, damage, and armour mitigation. As usual, the Gauss Technology itself provides only the framework, with additional research required to hammer out the manufacturing details for each weapon type. We are sufficiently certain that it should be possible to improve on the technology with an Advanced Gauss Technology given further insight into the Vindicator Technology to apply a Mk-1 designation on this series of weapons. This technology should be readily applied to a ground vehicle mounted Gauss weapon, allowing us to devise production protocols for this, and once we have a Mech, it should be straight forward to produce a Gauss weapon for it. We can see an aircraft weapon using this technology in the future, provided we can improve on our Alien Alloy fabrication technique: the standard one will not be resilient enough for the stresses foreseen. Pulse Technology The Pulse Technology is our answer the Alien Wave Technology. While we are still unable to replicate the underlying technical solutions the aliens use in both the Phaser and Wave Technology, we have gained sufficient technical know-how to step up our Laser Technology a notch. In our Laser weapons, we perform photon multiplication in a lasering chamber and then release the resultant laser beam. However, this technique means the energy in that beam is "stretched out" into a beam that is as long as the length of the chamber (which means larger weapons typically generate longer beams). While the time it takes for light to travel such a distance is instantaneous in human terms, it has an effect physically. With the Pulse Technology, we have cut the size of the lasering chamber roughly in half and have replaced the other half with an array of micro chambers, so once the main chamber has done its work, the beam is release into the micro chamber array, where they undergo a slight further amplification, but, more importantly, are compressed to a length of only one wave length and then all the micro channels release their energy simultaneously, resulting in a series of extremely intense pulses spanned over the length of half the beam length of the corresponding Laser weapon. This results in an extremely rapid series of very high energy "blows", which results in more damage and less heat wasted in dissipation. Were you nodding off, Commander? Sorry, I got a bit carried away there. I'll move on to the practical effects of this technology then. We fully expect to improve on these weapons, and so the Mk-1 series we can research production protocols for are more of a prototype series than a fully battlefield ready one, but we're not producing lab prototypes: the weapons have the full range of ruggedisation and shielding, so the weapons won't break down (well, they will if the soldier is blown up, but we can't do anything about that level of abuse), but they may not have the technology's full potential. The most recent battlefield reports indicate the Pulse Technology is doing a good job in damage dealing, but some jobs are really better performed at a safer distance, so we are aiming for a very long range with a high armour mitigation at the expense of some power: We are able to shape energy packets to hit a small area, which means high armour mitigation, but we gave some issues with pumping additional power into them without getting into various issues with micro chamber burn through and the like. Thus, in terms of characteristics, this series of weapons mostly resembles the Laser range, although the power issue means we don't see the possibility to produce a true Sniper Rifle: instead, we can see the contours of a Precision weapon. Also, we don't see any potential for a Cannon. On the other hand, the Plasma Technology does a very good job in the raw power department. In addition to a standard set of infantry weapons, we are also ready to productify a vehicle mounted Pulse Gun, and, as indicated earlier, we expect to be able to improve on this technology to the Advanced level once we have concluded our studies of the Alien Wave Technology to the Advanced level. Rail Technology The aliens have, again, stepped up their Ballistic Technology level, and we, again, have a counter: The Rail Technology. We have changed from using magnetic coils to propel slugs to use electric rails to do so. As with the Gauss guns, the basic physics is well known, while the materials and other technology to make it feasible is completely new. A rail gun uses the Lorentz force to accelerate a slug made of a material that conducts electricity, but which doesn't have to be magnetic. The Lorentz force tries to expand the size of an electrical circuit, and by fixing the rails the only part that can cause an expansion is the slug that bridges the gap between the rails. For this to work, the rails have to be fixed to withstand the force trying to push them away from each other, and this has to be done using a virtually perfect insulator, or leak currents would path through it rather than through the slug. For the same reason, the rails need to be in nearly perfect vacuum to stop the air from providing a conduit when the extreme currents required are passed through the weapon (a side benefit is that this reduces the cooling needs for the weapon, as there almost no friction heat generated between the slug and the air). Now, from the physics to the battlefield: what does this Mk-1 line of weaponry bring to the table? We really need to step up our game, and we have concluded doing everything the Gauss Technology did but do it as well as we possibly can is our best path to success, which means higher damage, higher armour mitigation, an improved range, unfortunately at the expense of a higher weight. As the Gauss Technology is the previous Kinetic weapon technology, we expect the Rail Technology Mk-1 line to be superiour to the Gauss Technology Mk-1 line, but not provide a clear advantage over the Mk-2 line. As usual, the Rail Technology provides the ground works for weapons, but each weapon designed will have to be researched/designed separately to enable them to be produced. We should be able start designing Pistol, Carbine, Rifle, and Heavy Mk-1 weapon designs immediately, as well as a ground vehicle mounted Rail Gun. We don't foresee any problems designing a Mech mounted Rail Gun either, once we actually have a Mech design in place so we can design the mounting properly. We believe we would be able to design an aircraft mounted weapon using this technology, but likely would need to know more about Alien Singularity Cores to make that happen, and we obviously need to be able to produce Alien Alloys to make the parts. An aircraft weapon using both this technology and our take of the top tier Energy weapon technology ought to be a possible step up from an aircraft Rail Cannon. Lastly, we expect to follow our previous pattern of designing a Mk-2 line of weapons once we have a sufficiently firm grasp on the Alien Mass Technology to step it up to the Advanced level and then researched Advanced Rail Technology.

A very useful description, and something I certainly haven't been able to deduce as I expected a pattern. It's something that ought to be woven into the initial descriptions for the techs as that would give the rationale for why things are made the way they are. In my game I'm still on Division/Laser at the end of February, although I've developed a few Mk-1 weapons from Plasma and MAG, but nothing there seems to be sufficiently useful (as expected with Mk-1). I've checked how many bullets it takes to take out an Andron Soldier with a Division Rifle Mk-3: Bullet 20 was the first that caused damage, 21 didn't, every bullet thereafter did, and number 30 finally managed to put an end to it (and that's save scumming so every bullet actually hit). So yes, Androns are a major pain, in particular the ones that reaction fires, while it's fairly safe to pop out and whittle away at them most of the time. Most of the time I try to use Laser against them, though, but you use what you have available, and after the initial wave you do have time, but you may not have enough ammo if you're not conserving it. A question about techs, though: while it is logical to require Alloy Fabrication for heavy weapons (i.e. those mounted on various kinds of vehicles), I would expect you have that since a long time when you're researching Phase 4 techs, so should it be the advanced manufacturing tech or hardened manufacturing (not sure if two improved techs exist, of if it's only the hardening one)? The Sonic tech certainly doesn't match what I would have come up with... So it's a low speed (Mach 1) weapon that sort of uses a vacuum/air correspondent to cavitation in water.

A short batch this time: As far as I can see Rail is an improvement on Gauss, rather than the MAG I had expected? Rail Technology The aliens have, again, stepped up their Ballistic Technology level, and we, again, have a counter: The Rail Technology. We have changed from using magnetic coils to propel slugs to use electric rails to do so. As with the Gauss guns, the basic physics is well known, while the materials and other technology to make it feasible is completely new. A rail gun uses the Lorenz force to accelerate a slug made of a material that conducts electricity, but which doesn't have to be magnetic. The Lorentz force tries to expand the size of an electrical circuit, and by fixing the rails the only part that can cause an expansion is the slug that bridges the gap between the rails. For this to work, the rails have to be fixed to withstand the force trying to push them away from each other, and this has to be done using a virtually perfect insulator, or leak currents would path through it rather than through the slug. For the same reason, the rails need to be in nearly perfect vacuum to stop the air from providing a conduit when the extreme currents required are passed through the weapon (a side benefit is that this reduces the cooling needs for the weapon, as there almost no friction heat generated between the slug and the air). Now, from the physics to the battlefield: what does this Mk-1 line of weaponry bring to the table? For starters, this weapon range behaves much like an improved version of the Gauss line of weapons in terms of capabilities, rather than the MAG line. As usual, the Rail Technology provides the ground works for weapons, but each weapon designed will have to be researched/designed separately to enable them to be produced. We should be able start designing Pistol, Carbine, Rifle, and Heavy Mk-1 weapon designs immediately, as well as a ground vehicle mounted Rail Gun. We don't foresee any problems designing a Mech mounted Rail Gun either, once we actually have a Mech design in place so we can design the mounting properly. We believe we would be able to design an aircraft mounted weapon using this technology, but likely would need to know more about Alien Singularity Cores to make that happen, and we obviously need to be able to produce Alien Alloys to make the parts. An aircraft weapon using both this technology and our take of the top tier Energy weapon technology ought to be a possible step up from an aircraft Rail Cannon. Lastly, we expect to follow our previous pattern of designing a Mk-2 line of weapons once we have a sufficiently firm grasp on the Alien Mass Technology to step it up to the Advanced level and then researched Advanced Rail Technology. Advanced Rail Technology As we expected, we have been able to integrate Ballistic Cores into our Rail Technology to allow us to design Mk-2 version building on the Mk-1 versions in this weapon line. Apart from this more or less standard result of our research, we also think we are closing in on an advanced version of a Mech Rail Gun, but we expect to require knowledge of the current Alien explosives technology level to make this happen. There is hope we may be able to combine our technology to catch up on the Alien Ion Technology with knowledge of the current level Alien explosives technology to produce a hybrid technology aircraft weapon. Rail Pistol Mk-1 The Rail Pistol Mk-1 is an improvement on the Gauss Pistol Mk-1, but trades a higher damage for a lower armour mitigation than the Mk-2 version. You have to provide 8 Alien Alloys for us to be able to produce this weapon.

A new batch, including some updated Tech entries, including some new techno bullshit. Gauss Heavy Mk-3 The Gauss Heavy Mk-2 to Mk-3 retrofit improves the range, provides a marginally higher damage, and mitigates considerably more armour, all while improving the accuracy of the weapon considerably (admittedly from a low level). To perform this retrofit you have to provide 6 Ballistic Cores and 10 Alenium. Gauss Shotgun Mk-3 The Gauss Shotgun Mk-2 to Mk-3 upgrade results in a weapon with a slightly longer range, two additional pellets, a larger ammo clip capacity, and higher accuracy. This retrofit uses 4 Ballistic Cores and 8 Alenium. Plasma Technology We have finally cracked the Plasma nut, Commander. This research allows us to start researching Plasma Rifles and Plasma Pistols of our own design, as well as aircraft and ground vehicle borne systems. It should be noted that the Plasma Technology isn't a straight upgrade of the Laser Technology, but rather a complement to it, as the two technologies have different characteristics. While both technologies deal Energy damage, the Laser weapon technology strengths are long range, high accuracy, high armour mitigation, and a large ammo clip capacity. Plasma weapons, on the other hand, excel at dealing out large amounts of damage. Thus, it's a matter of stand off finesse versus in-your-face brute force, smashing through armour (paving the way for further attacks, should any be necessary), if you will. It is not unlikely you will find different weapons in the arsenal more suitable for one technology than the other, with your overall battlefield tactics having a dominating influence on your loadout selections. Together with an understanding of how the Advanced Alien Plasma Technology works we should have all that's needed to start researching our own Advanced Plasma Technology. MAG Technology While the Alien Matergy weapons abuse the laws of physics in absurd ways, they work and work well, which means we would do well to imitate it and push our theoretical objections to the side. While we have no means to fabricate the actual firing mechanism the aliens use, we are able to extract one set of key parts from each Matergy weapon disassembled, which means they are sufficiently abundant that we won't need to keep track of their number, as long as we are not trying to produce them for profit (a prospect the spy shot down anyway). Thus, we expect this research to outline the common groundwork for our own MAG series of weapons, allowing us to proceed to research manufacturing protocols for each individual weapon type in the series. Given past experience, we are bold enough to anticipate future improvements on the technology, and we thus name this line Mk-1. We must stress that the MAG Technology isn't a straight forward improved Division Technology. Rather, it is a complement, as the weaponry of the two technologies have different common characteristics, even though both technology deal Kinetic damage. MAG weapons typically replace the highest accuracy aiming mode of the Division Technology with a burst mode, and there is no hope of making a cannon shell that survives being expelled in the extreme fashion employed by the MAG Technology and yet explode on impact: A shell with any kind of internal structure simply isn't an option. Given these differences, you are likely to find some weapons work better with one technology than the other, and your battlefield tactics should have a huge impact in your loadout choices. Pulse Technology <Are the texts for the Pulse Rifle and Pulse Carbine jumbled in the new loadout screen? The image and location would suggest a Carbine weapon, while the text describes a Rifle one, and vice versa> The Pulse Technology is our answer the Alien Wave Technology. While we are still unable to replicate the underlying technical solutions the aliens use in both the Phaser and Wave Technology, we have gained sufficient technical know-how to step up our Laser Technology a notch. In our Laser weapons, we perform photon multiplication in a lasering chamber and then release the resultant laser beam. However, this technique means the energy in that beam is "stretched out" into a beam that is as long as the length of the chamber (which means larger weapons typically generate longer beams). While the time it takes for light to travel such a distance is instantaneous in human terms, it has an effect physically. With the Pulse Technology, we have cut the size of the lasering chamber roughly in half and have replaced the other half with an array of micro chambers, so once the main chamber has done its work, the beam is release into the micro chamber array, where they undergo a slight further amplification, but, more importantly, are compressed to a length of only one wave length and then all the micro channels release their energy simultaneously, resulting in a series of extremely intense pulses spanned over the length of half the beam length of the corresponding Laser weapon. This results in an extremely rapid series of very high energy "blows", which results in more damage and less heat wasted in dissipation. Were you nodding off, Commander? Sorry, I got a bit carried away there. I'll move on to the practical effects of this technology then. We fully expect to improve on these weapons, and so the Mk-1 series we can research production protocols for are more of a prototype series than a fully battlefield ready one, but we're not producing lab prototypes: the weapons have the full range of ruggedisation and shielding, so the weapons won't break down (well, they will if the soldier is blown up, but we can't do anything about that level of abuse), but they may not have the technology's full potential. In terms characteristics, this serie's line of weapons should be similar to the Laser one, with the same set of strengths, which means long range, high accuracy, high armour mitigation, and a high ammo clip capacity, while The Plasma Technology excels at raw power. In addition to a standard set of infantry weapons, we are also ready to productify a vehicle mounted Pulse Gun, and, as indicated earlier, we expect to be able to improve on this technology to the Advanced level once we have concluded our studies of the Alien Wave Technology to the Advanced level. Advanced Pulse Technology We have finally been able to improve our understanding of the Pulse Technology to the Advanced level. In practical terms, this means that we have figured out how to use Energy Cores to improve our Pulse Technology weapons to the Mk-2 level. In addition to this, we think we would be able to research an aircraft weapon based on the Pulse Technology if we can get better a construction material than regular Alien Alloys, as they just won't cut it, and assuming we have a Mech to mount it in, we ought to be able to produce a Mech weapon based on this technology if we also have sufficient explosives knowledge. It may also be possible to research a new ground vehicle cannon, but naturally, such a weapon requires explosives knowledge, and we probably need Kinetic weapon knowledge that's up to it. Pulse Pistol Mk-1 This Pistol is superiour to the Laser Pistol Mk-2 on all points except range and ammo clip capacity. We require 4 Alien Alloys to produce one of these. Pulse Carbine Mk-1 The Pulse Carbine Mk-1 outperforms a Laser Carbine Mk-2 on all points except range and ammo clip capacity, despite the lower number of shots per salvo. 6 Alien Alloys are required to manufacture this weapon. Pulse Rifle Mk-1 The Laser Rifle Mk-2 is inferiour to this weapon on all points except range. To get one of these you will have to provide us with 6 Alien Alloys. Precision Pulse Mk-1 This weapon outperforms the Precision Laser Mk-2 on all points except range and ammo clop capacity. This weapon uses 9 Alien Alloys is its manufacture. Pulse Heavy Mk-1 If you are using a Gatling Laser Mk-2 you should upgrade to this weapon ASAP. 6 Alien Alloys are used in the manufacturing process of this weapon. Pulse Minigun Mk-1 This weapon bests the Laser Minigun Mk-2 on all points except the ammo clip capacity. We require 24 Alien Alloys to produce a Pulse Minigun Mk-1 for you. Pulse Pistol Mk-2 This weapon improves on the Mk-1 version on all points, in particular the ammo clip capacity. 4 Energy Cores and 6 Alien Alloys are consumed in the production of this weapon. Pulse Carbine Mk-2 This model improves upon its predecessor by sporting a larger ammo clip capacity and an additional shot in the burst. We will use 4 Energy Cores and 6 Alenium when producing this weapon. Pulse Rifle Mk-2 While this weapon improves on the Mk-1 version on all points, the extra "bullet" in a burst should be highlighted. The manufacture of this weapon requires 4 Energy Cores and 6 Alien Alloys. Precision Pulse Mk-2 A significant boost in the ammo clip capacity is the largest difference compared to its Mk-1 sibling, but everything else is improved too. 6 Energy Cores plus 9 Alien Alloys are required to allow us to produce the Precision Pulse Mk-2. Pulse Heavy Mk-2 Double the ammo clip capacity and an additional "bullet" per shot are the features standing out when comparing this weapon to the Pulse Heavy Mk-1, but basically everything has been improved. We require 4 Energy Cores and 6 Alien Alloys to produce this weapon. Pulse Minigun Mk-2 The Pulse Minigun Mk-2 improves on the Mk-1 on all accounts, but the additional "bullets" per shot and the increased ammo clip capacity stand out. We need 24 Energy Cores and 8 Alien Alloys to give you this weapon. Pulse Pistol Mk-3 Virtually nothing is left untouched when this weapon is upgraded. We require 4 Energy Cores and 8 Alenium to upgrade this weapon. Pulse Carbine Mk-3 The number of shots in the burst has increased, which is the main feature of this upgrade, but most aspects have been improved. To upgrade this weapon we require 4 Energy Cores and 8 Alenium. Pulse Rifle Mk-3 Improvements all around. The ammo clip capacity has been increased to a whopping 90. The upgrade of this weapon consumes 4 Energy Cores and 8 Alenium. Precision Pulse Mk-3 50% higher ammo clip capacity and improvements on all fronts is what this upgrade achieves. 6 Energy Cores and 10 Alenium are used when we upgrade your Mk-2 weapon. Pulse Heavy Mk-3 The main features of this upgrade is an ammo clip capacity that is more than doubled and an additional "bullet" per shot. We require you to part with 4 Energy Cores and 8 Alenium, together with your weapon, to upgrade it to Mk-3 status. Pulse Minigun Mk-3 Better all around, with 10 additional "bullets" per burst and 50% higher ammo clip capacity. 24 Energy Cores and 10 Alenium are used to perform this upgrade.

Drakunian sounds better than Drakuship.

The name's silly, of course, but I'm not opposed to it (Though the less direct alternatives Dragon or Dragonship [retaining a Viking reference] would work as well). I'll accept what you decide. 8 tabs makes weapon tech naming rather simple, I think (and scrolling the lists less of a pain). An excellent improvement.

It's not intuitively obvious to a newcomer that what looks like an improved ballistic or energy tech isn't, but rather provides a different take on capabilities, so I think that ought to be pointed out. It took me a long time to realize that the four categories actually are supposed to be different and it isn't a mistake to add a new rung to the "most primitive" tech (and the names of the categories do not help in that regard). Mr Newbie just developed Laser, so what would he want to know? Well, It's Energy rather than Kinetic, and I think that message makes it through, and at that stage that might be all you need to know, because that's the only parameter you have to play with. Ballistic generally fares worse in my experience, but you need it for some things, so I split my squad between the two kinds. When you get to MAG, it just gets confusing currently, as what should be just another Kinetic tier (as far as Mr Newbie has been told so far) doesn't provide straight replacements, but is oddly different, which he finds out only after researching the individual weapons and looking at the stats (which he may not do, assuming it a straight improved version of what's known, and the science guys really should know the grunts need to know...). So, MAG is Kinetic, but it's its own thing: Burst mode rather than the highest aim level vs Division's larger range and cannon. What about accuracy and armor penetration? Plasma: Well, again, we ought to tell the player what the strong points of Laser vs Plasma are, and explain they're different, as we don't know which order the player will develop the techs in, so we need to do the same thing here for Division/MAG. So you say Laser is Long Range, High Accuracy, while Plasma is High Damage. Anything else? Gauss/Pulse: Here we need to explain that they relate to Division/Laser and have the same strong and weak point as those. I'd repeat the different key characteristics between the "families" though, for convenience, and point out anything that's unexpected. The weapon characteristics you favor are highly dependent on how you want to use your troops, and I have definitely toyed with the idea of carrying a different kind of weapon in the backpack (I sort of do already, in the form of rocket launchers for many soldiers, and everyone carries a whiffle stick). Thus, I agree (trying to) draw the conclusions for the player isn't the best option, and I've tried to refrain from doing so. Higher damage vs better penetration? What you want presumably depends on what you want to deal with. Having had to withdraw once due to running out of bullets (well, not quite out: my estimate said I'd run out before getting halfway through the Androns guarding the ship), and finished a terror mission with, I think, 3 soldiers completely out and everyone else dangerously low (certainly no spare clips to share), despite save scumming until they hit, I'm personally very wary of low ammo capacity.

@Fox: I fail to see what's "stupid" about a request to make a quote into a proper quote, rather than a post of something that's probably a translation into Russian of a quote. I agree the joke was a bit lame, though. Edit: By the way, have you verified that your problems aren't caused by your translator "translating" links that might have been in the original text into garbage? Here's a new set of X-Pedia entry candidates. <One thing I think is missing is a technical summary of the weapon techs in their research description, i.e. how they perform both compared to the earlier/parallel techs, i.e. Gauss vs MAG and Division. Similarly, the broad strokes of Mk-2 vs Mk-1 ought to be outlined in the Advanced Tech. However, I don't think I have a sufficient grasp and overview to produce the technical basis for such comparisons.> Gauss Technology We have made another breakthrough, Commander. After studying the alien Vindicator Technology, we have been able to use the technology to prepare the ground for the development of a new weapons technology series of our own, the Gauss Technology. The physics theory behind this line of weapons is well known, so our problems have been technical rather than theoretical, i.e. how to produce sufficiently strong magnetic fields without affecting the surroundings (you don't want nails to be pulled out of boards to come flying at the weapon, nor have the weapon pulled away towards e.g. a ground vehicle), and how to provide enough energy in the ammo clips and discharge that energy quickly enough. And, of course, the whole contraption would have to fit the general shape and weight, and function of a normal weapon. So, how does a Gauss weapon work? The basic principle is actually the same as that of the MAG Technology, but applied in a much more sensible fashion: a coil shaped electro magnet pulls a magnetic slug towards its center. As soon as the center is reached, the current is cut, and the bullet continues forward through the hole. A pistol would use a single coil, while a sniper rifle would use a series of coils such that the second coil is magnetised as the first one is disabled, pulling the bullet forward at ever increasing speeds. As usual, the Gauss Technology itself provides only the framework, with additional research required to hammer out the manufacturing details for each weapon type. We are sufficiently certain that it should be possible to improve on the technology with an Advanced Gauss Technology given further insight into the Vindicator Technology to apply a Mk-1 designation on this series of weapons. This technology should be readily applied to a ground vehicle mounted Gauss weapon, allowing us to devise production protocols for this, and once we have a Mech, it should be straight forward to produce a Gauss weapon for it. We can see an aircraft weapon using this technology in the future, provided we can improve on our Alien Alloy fabrication technique: the standard one will not be resilient enough for the stresses foreseen. Advanced Gauss Technology Advancing on our Gauss Technology, we have now managed to penetrate the technical details of the Advanced Vindicator Technology sufficiently to integrate Ballistic Cores into our Gauss Technology weapons for an improved effect, which paves the ground for a Mk-2 line of weapons. We think we might be able to use the magnetic manipulation knowledge and techniques developed to help produce a vehicle mounted energy cannon, but the bulk of that research would obviously have to build on energy technology, probably with a helping of explosives technology. Assuming we have a Mech, we also ought to be able to use the same foundations as the ones needed for a vehicle energy weapon to produce a better Mech mounted one, but we would probably need input from explosives technology as well. Gauss Pistol Mk-1 The Gauss Pistol Mk-1 is superious to the MAG Pistol Mk-1 in every way. The comparison to higher tier MAG Pistols is less clear, though, as those provide a higher armour mitigation, but produce less damage. The Gauss Pistol Mk-1 provides a longer range than the lower tier MAG Pistols, and replaces the burst mode of those with an aimed shot mode. We require 4 Alien Alloys to be able to manufacture this weapon. Gauss SMG Mk-1 The Gauss SMG Mk-1 causes 50% more damage than the Division SMG Mk-3 (there is no SMG in the MAG lineup), but suffers from lower accuracy and a poorer armour mitigation. 6 Alien Alloys are used in the production of this weapon. Gauss Rifle Mk-1 The Gauss Rifle Mk-1 performs favourably compared to the MAG Rifle Mk-1, but its poorer armour mitigation is probably not compensated for by the higher damage when compared to the higher MAG tiers. To have one of these produced you have to provide us with 6 Alien Alloys. Gauss Shotgun Mk-1 You would probably want to replace a MAG Carbine Mk-1 with the Gauss Shotgun Mk-1 unless you don't want to give up the burst firing mode. Compared to the higher tier MAG Carbines, the Gauss Shotgun Mk-1 deals more damage per bullet, but has fewer bullets per shot. The production of this weapon consumes 6 Alien Alloys. Gauss Sniper Mk-1 The Gauss Sniper Mk-1 is a true sniper rifle superiour to the Division Sniper Mk-3 in damage and accuracy, while suffering from a poorer armour mitigation. Comparing it to the MAG line is trickier, as the MAG Precision has traded a burst mode for a sniper mode and a long range. This weapon is clearly superiour to the Mk-1 in all aspects except the burst mode. 9 Alien Alloys are needed to produce this weapon. Gauss Heavy Mk-1 At 50% higher damage and a slightly longer range, but a poorer armour mitigation and a considerably poorer accuracy this weapon is not a clear winner when pitted against a Division Heavy Machinegun Mk-3, but it may compete with the Mk-2 version. It is probably a better choice than a MAG Storm Mk-1, but probably not compared to the higher tier MAG Storm weapons. We will consume 6 Alien Alloys in the production of this weapon. Gauss Minigun Mk-1 The Gauss Minigun Mk-1 is a clear improvement over the Division Minigun Mk-1, but inferiour to the Division Minigun Mk-3. It ought to out perform the MAG Minigun Mk-1, but probably not the higher tiers. 24 Alien Alloys are needed to produced this weapon. Gauss Pistol Mk-2 This weapon is clearly superiour to the Mk-1 model, as it sports a much better armour mitigation at a longer range, with more damage, and with better precision. This weapon requires 6 Ballistic Cores and 6 Alien Alloys for its production. Gauss SMG Mk-2 Everything is better with this Gauss SMG model than the predecessor: range, damage, armour mitigation, and accuracy. We can provide one of these beauties for the low, low price of 4 Ballistic Cores and 6 Alien Alloys. Gauss Rifle Mk-2 The Gauss Rifle Mk-2 outperforms outperforms the Mk-1 on all fronts: range, damage, armour mitigation, and accuracy. This weapon costs 4 Ballistic Cores and 6 Alien Alloys. Gauss Shotgun Mk-2 Two additional pellets per shot and a higher accuracy than the Mk-1 are good reasons to switch to the Gauss Shotgun Mk-2. We can produce this weapon if you can provide us with 4 Ballistic Cores and 6 Alien Alloys. Gauss Sniper Mk-2 The Gauss Sniper Mk-2 has a longer range, deals more damage, mitigates more armour, and is more accurate than the Mk-1 version. One of these fine weapons will set you back 6 Ballistic Cores and 9 Alien alloys. Gauss Heavy Mk-2 The Gauss Heavy Mk-2 has a longer range, deals more damage, mitigates more armour, and is more accurate than the Mk-1 model. We need 6 Ballistic Cores and 6 Alien Alloys to produce this weapon. Gauss Minigun Mk-2 Longer range, more damage, more armour mitigation, and higher accuracy are reasons to replace a Gauss Minigun Mk-1 with a Mk-2. Production of this weapon consumes 24 Ballistic Cores and 8 Alien alloys. Gauss Pistol Mk-3 The Mk-3 upgrade of the Gauss Pistol Mk-2 provides a longer range, a slightly increased damage, considerably better armour penetration, and better accuracy. This upgrade uses 6 Ballistic Cores and 8 Alenium. Gauss SMG Mk-3 Upgrading a Gauss SMG Mk-2 to Mk-3 status results in a weapon with a longer range, marginally higher damage, and an improved armour mitigation. The upgrade process for this weapon consumes 4 Ballistic Cores and 8 Alenium. Gauss Rifle Mk-3 When you upgrade your Gauss Rifle Mk-2 to Mk-3 status you gain a longer range, marginally higher damage, a significant armour mitigation improvement, and improved accuracy. We will use 4 Ballistic Cores and 8 Alenium when performing this upgrade. Gauss Shotgun Mk-3 The Gauss Shotgun Mk-2 -> Mk-3 upgrade results in a weapon with a slightly longer range, two additional pellets, a larger ammo clip capacity, and higher accuracy. This retrofit uses 4 Ballistic Cores and 8 Alenium. Gauss Sniper Mk-3 The upgrade of a Gauss Sniper Mk-2 to Mk-3 status actually has one disadvantage: a slightly lower damage. The reason for this is that in order to achieve a huge improvement in armour mitigation, we had to change the shape of the bullet so the entry and exit wounds are smaller. On top of the armour penetration, the upgrade improves the range and accuracy of the weapon. This upgrade requires 6 Ballistic Cores and 10 Alenium. Gauss Heavy Mk-3 The Gauss Heavy Mk-2 -> Mk-3 retrofit improves the range, provides a marginally higher damage, and mitigates considerably more armour, all while improving the accuracy of the weapon considerably (admittedly from a low level). To perform this retrofit you have to provide 6 Ballistic Cores and 10 Alenium. Gauss Minigun Mk-3 The Gauss Minigun Mk-3 retrofit of the Mk-2 version results in a weapon with a longer range, marginally higher damage, considerably better armour mitigation, higher accuracy (while still abysmal), and twice the ammo clip capacity. Upgrading the Mk-2 monster to become even more monstrous costs 24 Ballistic Cores and 10 Alenium.

Here's revised version of the affected entries: Alien Advanced Neutron Technology We now have a decent grasp on the finer details of the Alien Neutron Technology, advancing our knowledge to the Advanced level. It seems we do not get any direct results from this research, but we should collect everything we can in case we actually do find a use for it (if nothing else, it will advance science when we have finally returned to peace). Advanced Plasma Technology Advancing our studies into the Plasma Technology has allowed us to develop Mk-2 versions of our Plasma weapons. Obviously, in order to do so, we first have to have done our homework by figuring out how to make the corresponding Mk-1 models. Advanced MAG Technology We believe we have now managed to devise the general procedure for incorporating Ballistic Cores into our MAG weapons, thus paving the way for research on production protocols for individual Mk-2 weapon types. Alien Dark Pistol The Alien Dark Pistol seems to somehow generate anti matter and keep it shielded from matter until reaching the target, where the resulting matter/anti matter annihilation causes a devastating burst of radiation (mostly through heat, although the radiation can undoubtedly cause mutations should the target survive long term, and some level of radiation poisoning which we have instructed our medical staff to treat in a post mission checkup routine). Paul, or Alien Rebel (we obviously can't produce the radio bursts that go for his name, so he's chosen "Paul" as his human name), claims he knows about these weapons (there is apparently a full range of types) through hearsay only, and it appears to use very advanced technology, even from an Alien perspective. To begin studies on the Alien Dark Technology, we probably have to examine an Alien Dark Cannon and an Alien Dark Assault weapon (after all, that's the pattern we've followed with other weapon types), as well as interrogating representatives of one or more Terror Soldier castes. While we should be able to understand some of the physics involved, will we ever be able to gather sufficient knowledge to actually replicate it? We're doubtful, but we shouldn't neglect the possibility, and so have produced a protocol for extraction of Antimatter Cores from these weapons. 3 of these weapons should provide us with 2 Antimatter Cores when disassembled.

I can cut the antimatter stuff out if you want. It would probably be best hinted at through some comment on how these weapons work (in the research of the weapons themselves, extracting the cores just in case we find a use for them?). And my telepathy receptor is still non functioning, so I didn't know you intended it to be secret rather than just bloody hard to reach.

My math circuits are still working somewhat, but the telepathy ones have never worked. Another batch: Caesan Engineer Interrogation <Removed ugly colons> This captive had much to say, and we made sure he did say it... &#8226; Assuming we have an Alien Power Source, we should now know enough to figure out how to disassemble it safely. &#8226; Assuming we have an Alien Anti Gravity Generator at hand, we should have be able to research it without blowing our up our facilities or launching them into space (in pieces...). &#8226; Similarly, with an Alien Base Core at hand, we should be ready to investigate Alien Base Facilities. &#8226; We should also be able to safely research the Alien Reactor as soon as we have one. &#8226; We can see an Light Support Tank, 'Scimitar', taking form once we have interrogated a Sebillian Engineer and figured out how to deal with Alien Powersources, Alien Electronics, and how to fabricate Alien Alloys. &#8226; The crystal ball also reveals a more advanced Light Tank in the distance, although we are likely to need quite a lot to actually be able to start to research it. The basic prerequisites are Alien Alloy Fabrication, Alien Electronics, and Alien Reactor for the components, and Disassembly of an Andron Server for the communications. On top of that, we probably need input from a Sebillian Engineer as well as appropriate encrypted data files from both the Caesan and the Sebillian side. &#8226; A more advanced Hunter car may be easier to reach, as we think we need only technical knowledge in the form of Alien Powersource, Alien Electronics, and Alien Alloy Fabrication research. &#8226; To research a dropship, 'Shrike' we should now only need techical research in the form of Alien Alloy Fabrication, Directional Thruster Array, and Alien Electronics. &#8226; Shock Technology should be within our reach, assuming we have researched the Alien Electronics Technology. &#8226; Given knowledge of the Alien Alloy Fabrication Technology, we should now be prepared to step it up to Alien Alloy Hardening. &#8226; As if that wasn't enough, he also filled in a few blanks in the Caesan Technician's story. Sebillian Engineer Interrogation <Removed ugly colons and replaced first line> We made him talk at length... &#8226; Assuming we have an Alien Power Source, we should now know enough to figure out how to disassemble it safely. &#8226; Assuming we have an Alien Anti Gravity Generator at hand, we should have be able to research it without blowing our up our facilities or launching them into space (in pieces...). &#8226; Similarly, with an Alien Base Core at hand, we should be ready to investigate Alien Base Facilities. &#8226; We should also be able to safely research the Alien Reactor as soon as we have one. &#8226; We can see an Light Support Tank, 'Scimitar', taking form once we have interrogated a Caesan Engineer and figured out how to deal with Alien Powersources, Alien Electronics, and how to fabricate Alien Alloys. &#8226; The crystal ball also reveals a more advanced Light Tank in the distance, although we are likely to need quite a lot to actually be able to start to research it. The basic prerequisites are Alien Alloy Fabrication, Alien Electronics, and Alien Reactor for the components, and Disassembly of an Andron Server for the communications. On top of that, we probably need input from a Caesan Engineer as well as appropriate encrypted data files from both the Caesan and the Sebillian side. &#8226; A more advanced Hunter car may be easier to reach, as we think we need only technical knowledge in the form of Alien Powersource, Alien Electronics, and Alien Alloy Fabrication research. &#8226; We foresee the ability to research a new Kinetic vehicle cannon once the technical prerequisites in the form of Alien Alloy Fabrication, Alien Electronics, and Alien Powersource are met. &#8226; Shock Technology should be within our reach, assuming we have researched the Alien Lightning Technology. &#8226; Given knowledge of the Alien Alloy Fabrication Technology, we should now be prepared to step it up to Alien Alloy Hardening. &#8226; As if that wasn't enough, he also filled in a few blanks in the Sebillian Technician's story. Plasma Cannon Mk-3 The retrofit of the Plasma Cannon Mk-2 to Mk-3 status results in a number of changes. Firstly, the damage per shot has been increased by almost 20%, and secondly we have increased the ammo clip capacity to 6 shots. As this doesn't work out well with a 4 short burst, we have reduced the number of shots per burst to 3, for a slightly lower damage per burst, but it allows you to fire two burst in a round rather than one, assuming you start with a full clip. Upgrading the Plasma Cannon Mk-2 to Mk-3 status costs you 12 Energy Cores and 4 Alenium. Advanced Alien Matergy Technology Well, this research has a fairly clear result: assuming we have the MAG Technology in place, we should be ready to improve on that with research on the Advanced MAG Technology. Alien Matergy Assault <Does this actually appear?> The Alien Matergy Assault Rifle is fairly similiar to the Alien Matergy Rifle. If we have studied an Alien Matergy Pistol and possibly interrogated a wielder of this technology we ought to be ready for studies of the Alien Matergy Technology. We can gain 1 Ballistic Cores from every 2 of these weapons. MAG Technology While the Alien Matergy weapons abuse the laws of physics in absurd ways, they work and work well, which means we would do well to imitate it and push our theoretical objections to the side. While we have no means to fabricate the actual firing mechanism the aliens use, we are able to extract one set of key parts from each Matergy weapon disassembled, which means they are sufficiently abundant that we won't need to keep track of their number, as long as we are not trying to produce them for profit (a prospect the spy shot down anyway). Thus, we expect this research to outline the common groundwork for our own MAG series of weapons, allowing us to proceed to research manufacturing protocols for each individual weapon type in the series. Given past experience, we are bold enough to anticipate future improvements on the technology, and we thus name this line Mk-1. Advanced MAG Technology We believe we have now managed to devise the general procedure for incorporating Ballistic Cores into our MAG weapons, thus paving the way for research on production protocols for individual Mk-2 weapon types. We think we also have gained a small part of the puzzle behind the Basic Antimatter weapons the aliens use, but it is likely we need to research more or less every theoretical technology we can, and probably interrogate Basic Antimatter weapon users on top of that, to make headway in that department. MAG Carbine Mk-1 The MAG Carbine fulfills the role of a shotgun in the MAG family. It is an in-your-face range rapid fire weapon firing a hail of bullets that pair Kinetic damage with significant stun and suppression effects (although you will probably need to follow it up with less damaging stun effects if you want to capture the target alive). We require 4 Alien Alloys to produce one of these weapons. MAG Precision Mk-1 This weapon is a Precision Rifle, not a Sniper Rifle. It has a longer range than the MAG Rifle, sports 50% higher damage and a significant armour mitigation. A high TU cost 3 bullet burst mode replaces a sniper rifle's Sniper mode, and the range is shorter than that of a true sniper rifle. However, like a sniper rifle, this is a heavy weapon, so don't expect to hit anything while on the move. Production of this weapon consumes 6 Alien Alloys. MAG Minigun Mk-1 The MAG Minigun Mk-1 is a minigun, which means it fires a hail storm of bullets in each burst. It is clearly superiour to the Division Minigun Mk-1. The higher number of bullets in each burst should edge the Mk-2 out as well, unless the lower armour mitigation is a critical factor. The materials cost of this weapon is 12 Alien Alloys. MAG Pistol Mk-2 The MAG Pistol Mk-2 is a clear improvement over the Mk-1 version. It deals more than 20% more damage with a significantly better armour mitigation and improved accuracy. The cost of producing this weapon is 2 Ballistic Cores and 4 Alien Alloys. MAG Rifle Mk-2 The MAG Rifle Mk-2 deals 20% higher damage with a significantly better armour mitigation and higher accuracy. We require 2 Ballistic Cores and 4 Alien Alloys for each weapon produced. MAG Carbine Mk-2 20% more bullets per shot with a higher accuracy summarises the differences between the Mk-2 and Mk-1 versions of this weapon. 2 Ballistic Cores and 4 Alien Alloys are used in the production of this weapon. MAG Precision Mk-2 20% higher damage, about 50% stronger armour mitigation, and a higher accuracy are the key differences between the Mk-2 and Mk-1 versions of this weapons. This weapon needs 4 Ballistic Cores and 6 Alien Alloys for its construction. MAG Storm Mk-2 The MAG Storm Mk-2 deals 25% higher damage and mitigates considerably more armour than the MAG Storm Mk-1, while improving on the accuracy. We require 4 Ballistic Cores and 4 Alenium Alloys to produce this weapon. MAG Minigun Mk-2 The MAG Minigun Mk-2 deals 33% more damage and mitigates more armour than the Mk-1. It is also more accurate, although the accuracy is still abysmal, so you won't miss out on the emergent area effect when firing this weapon. 12 Ballistic Cores and 4 Alien Alloys are used in the production of this weapon. MAG Pistol Mk-3 This pistol improves the range over the Mk-2 model. It also deals about 10% more damage and mitigates a fair bit more armour. Finally, the burst mode fires 4 rather than 3 bullets. We can upgrade a Mk-2 weapon with 2 Ballistic Cores and 4 Alenium. MAG Rifle Mk-3 The Mk-3 upgraded version of the MAG Rifle has a larger range, slightly higher damage, and considerably better armour mitigation than the Mk-2 version. It also fires 4 bullets per burst in burst mode rather than 3. This upgrade costs 2 Ballistic Cores and 4 Alenium. MAG Carbine Mk-3 This upgrade provides two additional bullets per shot and a marginally larger range, compared to the Mk-2 version of this weapon. The Mk-3 treatment of a MAG Carbine Mk-2 consumes 2 Ballistic Cores and 4 Alenium. MAG Precision Mk-3 The MAG Precision Mk-3 provides 10% longer range, about 10% higher damage, and significantly better armour mitigation compared to the Mk-2 version. This upgrade used 4 Ballistic Cores and 4 Alenium. MAG Storm Mk-3 The upgrade of a MAG Storm Mk-2 to Mk-3 status provides substantial benefits: Increased range, 5% higher damage per bullet, significantly better armour mitigation, 10 bullets per burst rather than 8, and an increase in ammo clip capacity to still provide bullets for 5 bursts. Upgrading a MAG Storm Mk-2 to Mk-3 status sets you back 4 Ballistic Cores and 4 Alenium. MAG Minigun Mk-3 Upgrading a MAG Minigun Mk-2 to Mk-3 status provides the weapon with a slightly longer range, 5% higher per bullet damage, better armour mitigation, a an increase in burst bullet count from 60 to 80, with a corresponding ammo clip capacity increase. We will use 12 Ballistic Cores and 4 Alenium in the process of upgrading this weapon.

Yes. Put the med kit in your hand and stand next to the soldier. Click on the unconscious soldier rather than the med kit wielding one. And, by the way, you can heal other soldiers as well as locals with that technique, so the injured soldier with the weapon that's actually effective against an enemy can kill it, while the one who's got something ineffective can take care of the healing. Saving locals provide brownie points, and a saved local soldier can act as a meat shield if he lives to fight another round. Healing an unconscious soldier wakes him up, which costs one healing point if otherwise uninjured, and I think reviving is done first, bleeding second, and HP healing last. A soldier woken up will become available the next turn (with the whole inventory in a pile on the ground, so most of that turn is typically spent picking up the stuff). I believe there is a role for medic in the game, although I've never used it. Edit: A new batch: Alien Neutron Technology The Alien Neutron Technology doesn't seem to be an upgrade of the Alien Plasma Technology as much as a complement to it, primarily used by the alien elite castes, i.e. Harridans and Wraiths. The weapons provide a slightly longer range than the Plasma weapons do, while dealing roughly the same amount of damage. Since Neutron and Plasma weaponry have some clear commonalities, this research should provide some of the groundwork required to research the advanced version of both technologies, although it's most likely not a strict requirement for Plasma Technology advancement. The Neutron Technology was named well before we had much of an idea of how it worked. About the only thing we knew was that it wasn't electrically charged like Plasma, and so the Neutron name stuck. However, it doesn't actually fire single Neutrons, but rather photons (like Phasers), but arranged in a peculiar arrangement of superposition and entanglement causing them to reach the target virtually without any interaction with small particles (such as smoke) in the intervening medium. This means almost all of the energy is delivered to the target, rather than some of it getting lost on the way. Note that the fact that the energy isn't dissipated does not help aiming, as smoke will still hinder their ability to aim. Advanced Alien Neutron Technology We now have a decent grasp on the finer details of the Alien Neutron Technology, advancing our knowledge to the Advanced level. It seems we do not get any direct results from this research, but rather a stepping stone on the road to understanding the Basic Antimatter Technology. However, to reach this pinnacle of technology we probably need to have acquired more or less everything else we can get technology wise on this level. Alien Toxin Technology The aliens employ a toxin technology that isn't fundamentally dissimilar to the chemical warfare techniques banned by the Geneva convention, although the aliens probably doesn't know about it, and probably wouldn't care if they did. It can be argued this convention doesn't apply to alien invaders, and, regardless, we need to study the chemicals used by the aliens to be able to look for antidotes (and such research is allowed by that convention, by the way). Anyway, our understanding of the Alien Toxin Technology, coupled with knowledge about their biologies, allows us to start research on an Advanced Chemical Gas Technology of our own. It's also reasonable to assume we ought to be able to further our studies to Advanced Alien Toxin Technology for the finer points provided we are able to examine samples of the more advanced weapons using this technology, at least if we're able to interrogate alien operators deploying it. Advanced Alien Toxin Technology We have made academic advances by studying Advanced Alien Toxin Technology, so we now have a good grasp of how it works. Unfortunately, we haven't been able to put that increased knowledge to any immediate use in the form of new research topics. We'll make sure to hold on to the knowledge, though, as you never know if it may be of use at some future time. If not, well, there is some interesting chemistry in there that may be put to a completely different use once this invasion has been thwarted. Alien Toxin Rifle The Alien Toxin Rifle fires what amounts to breakable syringes of neuro toxins that enter the body via the skin, eyes, or inhalation. It ought to be possible to device armours that provide additional resistance to these attacks, although this research is unlikely to help that along. However, this study has confirmed ours suspicions regarding the nature of these weapons, and ought to allow us to study the Alien Toxin Technology itself once we have examined a sufficient number of samples of weapons using this technology. Each of these weapons can now be disassembled to provide two Chemical Core kits. Alien Toxin Heavy The Alien Toxin Heavy is the heavy weapon type in the Alien Toxin weapon family. Study of this weapon has advanced our basic knowledge of the Alien Toxin Technology, but to actually start Advanced studies we probably need to examine the Cannon as well, and it wouldn't be surprising of we would have to interrogate Operators deploying these weapons as well. We have devised a disassembly protocol for these weapons to provide us with 3 Chemical Cores for each weapon processed. Alien Toxin Cannon This nasty weapon fires a round that bursts into a cloud of neuro toxins on impact. By studying this weapon we have increased our knowledge of the Alien Toxin Technology, but to reach the point at which we can start Advanced studies we probably need to examine the Alien Toxin Heavy as well, and there are some blanks which probably require interrogation, with Operators deploying these weapons being likely candidates. The disassembly protocol for these weapons provide us with 4 Chemical Cores for each weapon disassembled. Plasma Cannon Mk-1 This cannon is a cannon, which means it has an area effect outside of the target hit. It shares the common Mk-1 plasma technology trait of providing a high damage and a lousy ammo clip capacity (the burst mode empties the clip's 4 charges in one go, but that one go packs a lot of punch). We can produce this weapon using 12 Alien Alloys. Plasma Pistol Mk-2 The Plasma Pistol Mk-2 improves on the Mk-1 model by dealing 15-20% more damage with a higher (but still not stellar) accuracy and providing clips with a larger capacity. Production of this weapon requires 2 Energy Cores and 4 Alien Alloys. Plasma Rifle Mk-2 The Plasma Rifle Mk-2 deals about 15% more damage than the Mk-1 model and is more accurate as well. You need to provide 2 Energy Cores and 4 Alien Alloys to produce this weapon. Plasma Precision Mk-2 20% higher damage, some armour mitigation, and higher precision are the main differences between the Mk-2 and Mk-1 version of this weapon. The ammo clip capacity is still at 4 though. 4 Energy Cores and 6 Alien Alloys are required to produce one of these weapons. Plasma Caster Mk-2 You get about 15% higher damage and a higher accuracy with the Mk-2 version of this weapon compared to the Mk-1 model. This weapon costs you 2 Energy Cores and 4 Alien Alloys. Plasma Cannon Mk-2 The Plasma Cannon Mk-2 sports 20% higher damage and a higher accuracy than the Mk-1 model, but the ammo clip is still good for only a single burst. You have to provide 12 Energy Cores and 4 Alien Alloys to get one Plasma Cannon Mk-2. Plasma Pistol Mk-3 This upgrade provides a longer range, over 25% higher damage, and a larger ammo clip capacity than the Mk-2 version. Two Energy Cores and 4 Alenium is required to upgrade each Plasma Pistol Mk-2 to Mk-3 status. Plasma Rifle Mk-3 Over 20% more damage, a larger range, and a ammo clip capacity that's 50% higher is what this upgrade provides. To upgrade a Plasma Rifle Mk-2 to Mk-3 status you need to provide 2 Energy Cores and 4 Alenium. Plasma Precision Mk-3 This upgrade provides over 20% higher damage, a considerably longer range, and a 50% higher ammo clip capacity (which still isn't anything to write home about). We require 4 Energy Cores and 4 Alenium to be able to perform this upgrade. Plasma Caster Mk-3 You get over 25% higher damage, a slightly longer range, and a larger ammo clip capacity with this upgrade. The upgrade itself requires 2 Energy Cores and 4 Alenium. Plasma Cannon Mk-3 <This looks wrong. Less than 20% extra damage per shot, but a reduction of the burst count from 4 to 3. Longer range, better single shot damage, lower burst damage, and a larger ammo clip capacity>.

Another X-Pedia entry candidate batch. This means all the Division and Laser weapons are now covered. Division Pistol Mk-3 This retrofit process for the Division Pistol Mk-2 results in a weapon that deals about 15% more damage and mitigates more armour. Retrofitting a Division Pistol Mk-2 to the Mk-3 status requires the pistol itself, of course, as well as 1 Ballistic Core and one unit of Alenium. Division Sniper Rifle Mk-3 We are now able to retrofit a Division Sniper Rifle Mk-2 into a Mk-3 version. If you equipped your soldiers with the Mk-2 model you definitely want to upgrade, as the upgraded model provides a longer range, more than 10% more damage, and a significantly improved armour mitigation. Upgrading to one of these beauties will cost you 2 Ballistic Cores, 2 Alenium, and the Mk-2 weapon to be upgraded. Division Minigun Mk-3 If you're using a Division Minigun Mk-2 you definitely want to upgrade it to Mk-3 status. The main disadvantage is that you're running out of ammo fast, as it fires twice as many bullets in each burst, but the ammo clip capacity remains the same, although complaining about spending the bullets too quickly is probably a bit petty. The per bullet is increased by 10% and the armour mitigation is somewhat better. The weight has increased by another 3 kg to 18, though. The upgraded weapon is also more accurate than the older version, although this is by no means a precision weapon. To upgrade a Mk-2 model to Mk-3 status you need to spend 6 Ballistic Cores and 2 Alenium, as well as part with the weapon during the upgrade process. Division Cannon Mk-3 Upgrading a Division Cannon Mk-2 to the Mk-3 version is not a straight forward upgrade. Instead, provides a bit of a choice, as the Mk-3 version exchanges a rather modest armour mitigation for a larger area effect, although it does cause a modest amount of additional damage. You can upgrade your Division Cannon Mk-2 at the tune of 2 Ballistic Cores, 2 Alenium, and parting with the weapon to be retrofitted for the duration of the process. Gatling Laser Mk-1 This weapon does not have a standard arsenal correspondent. It is a heavy weapon that deals 50% more damage than a Precision Laser, but it has a slightly shorter range than the Laser Rifle and it avoids the problem of just drilling a narrow, non lethal, channel through the target by spreading the damage over a larger surface area (which results in it not having any armour mitigation). The ammo clip capacity is extremely poor at 3, though. Production of this weapon requires the use of 2 Alien Alloys. Laser Minigun Mk-1 The Laser Minigun Mk-1 does not correspond to any weapon in the standard arsenal, unless you would consider it to be a laser based Heavy Machinegun on steroids. The rotating barrels (for cooling purposes) result in a significant recoil, but being peppered by 40 modest strength laser shot can not be a pleasant experience, which means the target is unlikely to be able to resist suppression (should it survive). It is a heavy weapon, and thus suffers the corresponding penalties, and firing a burst takes a significant amount of time, so a suppressed soldier won't be able to recover sufficiently to fire it, nor can more than one burst be fired during a single turn. We require 6 Alien Alloys to produce this weapon. Gatling Laser Mk-2 The Gatling Laser Mk-2 improves on the Mk-1 model in most respects: almost 20% more damage, twice the ammo clip capacity (to a still paltry 6), and improved accuracy. The manufacture of this weapon requires 1 Energy Core and 2 Alien Alloys. Laser Minigun Mk-2 If you use a Laser Minigun, you should get a Mk-2 ASAP. This improved version is a significant improvement with 50% more shots per burst (60 vs 40), 3 times the ammo clip capacity, and we have also tuned the impact point radius of the beams to provide some armour mitigation. About the only negative thing about an upgrade is that you may need to upgrade to a brawnier soldier, as this weight training tool means lifting 20 kg just on its own. 6 Energy Cores and 2 Alien Alloys, that's what's required to allow us to produce this weapon. Laser Carbine Mk-3 By upgrading your Laser Carbine Mk-2 to Mk-3 status you increase the damage dealt by 20%, and increases the maximum range (although you'll be in the face of the enemy regardless). This upgrade uses 2 Energy Cores, 2 Alien Alloys, and the weapon to be upgraded, of course. Scatter Laser Mk-3 The Scatter Laser Mk-3 is a tradeoff retrofit. We have finally managed to implement a burst fire mode, but it comes at the cost of each shot, even in single fire mode, packing only about 2/3 of the previous punch. We need 1 Energy Core, 2 Alenium, and the Mk-2 weapon to perform this retrofit. Laser Minigun Mk-3 Apart from the weight (another 4 kg, to 24) this weapon is clearly superiour to the Mk-2 model. Further tuning of the laser "impact" area has improved the armour mitigation a little, to precision has been improved a little (although still not ready for a marksman competition any time soon), the number of shots in a burst has increased to 80, and the ammo clip capacity has managed to keep pace with the increased power consumption, so it is still capable of providing energy for 10 bursts. We can upgrade the Mk-2 weapon to Mk-3 status with the help of 6 Energy Cores and 2 Alien Alloys.

I believe both of those are from the vanilla game, but that's no reason not to adjust them. I'll try to do so. Edit: "Blind": = I can't bring the entries up in game to see what they look like, nor can I use the unit loadout screen to see weapon stats since I don't have access to those items in my game. Thus, everything will have to be based on rooting around in various files, hoping I look in the correct one. GAH! How was I supposed to know that the mod's files are overridden (partially, I assume, given the overriding file's much smaller size) by another mod? What other mods are overriding this mod?

A new version of the Roboreaper Soldier Disassebly and "blind" entries starting from the beginning of xenopedia.xml. I stopped at the Division Pistol Mk-3 as something definitely is wrong: the Mk-3 entries don't match what I see in the game for the weapons I have produced, so the minigun and cannon entries may be wrong too. Roboreaper Soldier Disassembly These units are another case of baffling alien robotic unit choices. What is even the point of creating a robotic imitation of the Reaper, when there are far more effective designs? Well, at least the enemy went for Robodogs rather than RoboXenomorphs... Like Robodogs, these units "hatch" from boxes deployed in the area, presumably based on a timer we are unlikely to be able to access (so we won't be able to predict when a box opens). These boxes are, of course, made of Alien Alloys, and thus rather hard to crack, and the only thing you have for your effort if you do is a Roboreaper released earlier than intended (but at full capacity), and less ammo. As opposed to Robodog boxes, these boxes seem to be stationary. It can be noted that this report isn't as complete as we would like, as the wreckage brought in for study is heavily damaged both as a results of its own "metamorphosis" process and the damage that finally disabled it, and the field reports are somewhat contradictory. Once a Roboreaper is released, it has been reported to sometimes employ a "force shield" of some kind, and sometimes not. If a force shield is present, it has to first be destroyed to cause actual damage (similar to shield carrying units, but with a 360 degree coverage). When the shield is finally brought down, the Roboreaper releases a cloud of potent stunning gas that also serves to obscure the Roboreaper. Fortunately, this cloud does not have much or any EMP effect, as so an be approached by ground vehicles. It can be noted that the force shield does not seem to have much of any damage resistance, and so seems possible to whittle away with any type of damage. A Roboreaper seems to behave the same whether having a shield or not: it employs a surprisingly weak ranged stun/EMP attack, and may even walk behind cover to make it harder to hit. This stage of the Roboreaper has an armour that is very resistant to Energy attacks, but somewhat susceptible to Ballistic damage. Once the Roboreaper is disabled, it will release a stunning/obscuring gas cloud (again, if a shield was present). The Roboreaper sheds what remains of the armour layer and armament, and continues in a melee attack form that, fortunately, is weaker than what must be possible to produce. This final Roboreaper form is very highly resistant to Ballistic damage, but is only somewhat resistant to Energy damage, and when the construct is finally brought down for the last time, it does not release any stun cloud, thankfully. Given all the sophistication involved in the Roboreaper, it is somewhat disappointing that the only thing we are able to salvage from it is a single unit of Alien Alloys: The box, weapons, and earlier armor layer are almost completely destroyed, with nothing useful left to salvage. Alien Lightning Scatter <Does this weapon actually appear? Can't find it in aiprops.xml?> Alien Ballistic Minigun The Alien Ballistic Minigun is a monster of a weapon, weighing in at 18 kg, and its devastating hail of bullets will not be stopped by any umbrella: it is likely to chew throw a shield, an armour, and a soldier all at once. There is one significant weakness in this type of weapons, however: firing a burst takes so long that suppression will leave the wielder with too few TUs to fire it. Each of these weapons can be disassembled to provide one Ballistic Core set. Division Minigun Mk-1 This weapon is heavy in more than one way. At 12 kg the solider wielding it has to be brawny, and its bulk and unwieldiness will make it extremely inaccurate if the soldier hasn't braced himself properly before firing. It also takes so long to fire a burst that only a single burst can be fired in a turn, and a suppressed unit will be unable to recover sufficiently to bring it to bear. However, being hit by a burst will be a serious threat to an alien's health, and it will be a courageous (or stupid) alien that doesn't duck when under fire by this weapon. There is no weapon corresponding to this in the standard weapon arsenal. Division Cannon Mk-1 This weapon has no predecessor in the standard arsenal. It is a man portable cannon firing shells with a small area effect outside of the substantial damage dealt on a direct hit. Division Minigun Mk-2 This evolved version of the Division Minigun Mk-2 adds 8 additional bullets per burst and provides some armour mitigation as well. The cost for this added destructive power is another 3 kg of weight, 6 Ballistic Cores, and 4 Alien Alloys. Division Cannon Mk-2 Division Technology, now with added armour mitigation. This evolved version of the Division Cannon brings some armour mitigation to the party at the tune of 2 Ballistic Cores and 3 units of Alien Alloys. Division Pistol Mk-3 <The manufacture description is probably not correct. The below is what I read from manufactures.xml:ManTech.division.pistolmk3, apart from that not requiring a base weapon to upgrade, so that looks like a straight manufacture rather than retrofit entry?> This retrofit process for the Division Pistol Mk-2 results in a weapon that deals about 15% more damage and mitigates more armour. Retrofitting a Division Pistol Mk-2 to the Mk-3 status requires the pistol itself, of course, as well as 2 Ballistic Cores, 4 units of Alien Alloys, and one unit of Alenium.

I agree the tech tree based writing is on the strong side, but on the other hand there ought to be something that provides some indication of what the research may be good for. I can certainly make the (new) entries more vague. Roboreaper: Given that it does use ranged stun/emp attacks I'd probably add the same components as robodogs (who seem to just bite) provide, e.g. one ballistic and one energy core. There seem to be a 3:1 - 4:1 ratio between robodogs and roboreapers so far.