TrashMan

Don't automate it. Leave in player hands. Like I said, right mouse click or mouse wheel adjustng cone/AP would work best.

Drones are useful, but the problem comes from jamming/hacking. The only way around that is to have AI (actually an Expert System, there is no true AI) so the drone/android accepts no commands from outside until the mission is complete. This comes with it's own problems, as now you have a drone/android that even you cannot stop until specific condition is achieved. The best condition should simply be time (no commands accepted for however long a mission would take). Also, the AI will be limited and unflexible. So yeah, they are already used, so why not. The question is in what roles would you use them. Personally, scouting/recon sounds the best. Even drone fighters for long-range combat (missile lobbing, not dogfighting)

Which is exactly why you want to get to it quickly. It still relies mostly on people to destroy sensitive stuff, of which there is usually only a few really interesting bits, and it takes time. Now, consider that for an alien ship, literally every single bit could be useful means that destroying al of it takes quite a bit more time and effort.

And JA2 is the greatest team strategy game to have ever been made.

Cyborgization is totally unnecessary and a waste of fund. Everything a cyborg could do wan be done with cheaper equipment that ISN'T premanently glued to a person (and would thus always be with him, which is problematic). When your soldiers goes home on leave or to drink in a pub, he leaves his exoskeleton and guns at the base armory. Your drunken cyborg would have it on his person all the time. BAD IDEA.

So? Suppresive fire can also be done with aim but doesn't have to be, and given that the cone would depend on actually AIMING, then you can have both. A wide cone when not aiming and just spraying, and a narrow when you do. The way Jagged Alliance 2 did was the best - the more AP's you spend, the more tighter the shot. As your mouse hovered over the enemy you got an aiming circle shooting AP cost. With a right click you could increase (cycle trough) the cost and the circle became smaller, indicating fireing. You basically had hipfire/no aim, fast aim, aim, careful aim. With mods it's gotten even deeper (and better). As far as I'm concerned you don't even need a % to hit displayed at all. Something simple as "good line of fire/visibility" / "bad line of fire/visibility" indicator would be more then enough, but I feel even that is unnecessary.

The total number of aircraft you will be able to hold at one of your bases is not only not final, but also depend on how many hangars you build. Although, if you ask me, airfield/hanger should be a separate geoscape building. Your base should only hold hangers for the transport, and fighters would be stantioned in fighter bases that you build. Those would be simple pre-fabs. an airfiled with hangers, supplies, pilot barracks and simple radar. You can upgrade the airfield to hold more planes and pilots, and upgrade the radar. This is simple, frees up slots on your base for important things, and neatly separates fighters and pilot managment away from your base. Also, it makes sense for an airbase to be a separate site.

1) nope. You have state-of-the art hardware that doesn't have self-destruct. B2 bomber? F35? Newest aircraft carrier? All may have newest tech that you wouldn't want your enemy to get. None of them have self-destructs. True, the tech difference is not that big, but the point stands. 2. Who sez you can't get a large enough fleet?

Nah. Phoenix Point has the cammera move to the gun POV so you can see how good the LOS is before taking a shot. Works easily. The whole "hit percentage this is not even really needed. All you need is LOS and the soldiers accuracy and you can guesstimate.

You had one job. One job. Why does (almost) no one bother to do proper projetile simulations anymore? In a 3D game it's trivial. Especially turn-based ones. Accuracy is basically the size of the fire cone. Fire projectile and see if it hit anything.

If my memory serves me right, Jagged Alliance 2 had infinite (well, across map) sight range, but obstacles could block it. Also, things like darkness and cammo could make someone harder to see. You could ambush unsuspecting patrols from behind the bushes (if you're next to it you can see trough, but enemies cannot really) Worked Wonderfully there.

But what if you can't? The Skyranger might not be fast enough. You might have been late in noticing the aliens. Why would more tactics and involvement in geospace be bad? As for micromanaging, it can be handled as easily as assigning permanent escort or groups/wings. Basicaly, in the base set up two fighters to escort your transport, and as long as those fighters are able they will launch with the transport automatically and escort it. Hell, it can work for any craft.

How many planes you know that have a self-destruct button? OR tanks? Or ships? It's common in movies, but it really isn't there. Even in WW2, they way to avoid capture was scuttling - usually by opening all comparments and letting the ship flood (that still make it recoverable with gear, and it's useless for alien spaceships) or blowing up the ammo maganizes (for that the vehicle must use high-explosive weapons to begin with. And it also leaves enough pieces to study). Self-destrust enver was a standard, and properly making sure nothing of value remains is time-consuming.

I just want to add something. You probably already considered this, but in terms of flexibiltiy (in general) and modding, how is damage of a weapon tied with ammo? IMHO, the best way is to have damage of a weapon defined both in the weapon itself AND in the ammo, with the ammo values (if defined) overriding the weapon values. Which means that it makes it easy to balance and create different weapon types, while still having different ammo types. So you can have different power cells for lasers with different capacities (but same damage.. or not), different ammos with different properties and values.

"Modeling properly" in this context means to make it work as intended. You don't really need super-accurate simulations for that, just approximations. And unless I'm mistaken, in Xenonauts 2 every projectile is fired in a cone and the hits and collisions are calculated (as it should be), which means shotgun should work properly with minimal effort

Doesn't matter if it's human or not. All technologly must fallow the basic laws. But let's not go further, this is de-railing the thread. To make any such mission more interesting, you can have variations, depending on type of craft that was downed, time that has passed and some other factors. The more time passes, the less rewards you get. There is a chance an alien craft will arrive at the crash site (you should be able to see it on geospace and intercept if necessary). If it lands it would speed up crashsite deterioration. Depending on size and type of the craft, when a Xenonauts force is arriving it may drop additional hostiles and leave, or try to intercept (escorts matter), or try to bomb the site (greatly reduces loot from site, but also reduces hostile count)

Just model a shotgun properly. It will find its niche. The whole point of a shotgun is to fill the air with lots of stuff at once.

I HATE that phrase. Sufficiently advanced technolgoy is NOT indistinguishable from magic, whoever said that is a moron. OK, it might be to a caveman who has no understanding of the most basic of physics, but once you do grasp the fundamentals then pass that treshold it does not apply anymore. But the point is that teleportation is so abuseable and can be so insanely OP with a bit of creative application, that it's best for writers to avoid it, unless they plan to spend a HUGE amount of time over it.

Why not give the shotgun more pellets per shot? Unless I'm mistaken, they use way more than 4.

I like this. And I agree that reaction/supression fire is more than just killing an enemy. If a hit lowers enemy TU or supresses them/stops their action, then it's doing it's job.

As I said, a can of worms. Once practical applications of said technology become evident, any sci-fi race using them seems like morons. There is no need for it when simple explanations work just fine.

Assault rifles are generalist weapons, which is why they are the most numnerous. Shotguns and SMG's are better for room clearing/corridor fighting - this why they are used by SWAT/Commandos on such missions. LGM's are for supression/crowd control. The point I'm making is the reason other weapons are less common is practicality - an assault rifles will preform well against most enemies at most ranges. This does not make them worse. They each have their role. And trying to force everything to be equal is silly. If I'm fighting in the wood or open terrain, assult rifles and snipers would make the bulk of my armament. Indoors? Shotguns and SMG's. Why would an equal distribution of weapons even be desirable?

I despise teleportation in 99% of sci-fi. Silly technology with tons and tons of loopholes. A can of worms best never opened. A far simpler explanation is that the aliens are rigging the thing to explode. Sabotaging/scuttling/destroying equipment and things that would be of use. No need for magical teleporters. Get there before they destroy everything worth salvaging.

Instead of separate AI's, better for the AI to have STATES. States would be (for example) PANIC, RETREAT, ESCAPE, HIDE, REGROUP, SEEK, ATTACK. Depending on type of NPC they would be going from state to state each turn, which would inform their objectives and behavior. Soldiers would have a high change of using smarter states (regroup, retreat) while a civilian would generally not. Also, AI being able to pick up weapons and use them (not likely) RETREAT - fall back to the edge of the map or a fortified position, catiously REGROUP - seek to link up with friendlies. ESCAPE - run away SEEK - cautious advance ASSIST - heal/defend or provide suppressive fire (friendlies have to be visible for this state) HIDE - seek a room or a place that blocks vision.

Because it's cheap? You have plenty of modern guns to choose from. MY personal favorite: And speaking of aircraft, stealth is GREATLY overrated. Most of the modern craft are trash that cannot be flown without computer assist and require three times as much maintanance. The best craft the US ever produces are the F-14, the A-10 and the F-15. The A-10 is a flying thank with the BRRRRT gun, nuff siad. The F-15 is a versatile craft with an amazing weight/thrust ratio. And the F-14 is hands down the best airframe ever designed. For such a big craft it had amazing speed and manouverabiltiy and flexibility. It could carry a huge payload and the B variant upgrade made it a premire ground attack craft of the navy, in addition to being an unparraelled interceptor. Those AIM54 Phoenix missiles have insane range and speed (big boys though). I have not met a navy pilot or carrier officer who didn't lament it's forced retirement (corruption and corporate sabotage saw it grounded before it's time) So Chris, if you have an advanced aircraft, make it F-14 inspired. The bow at the end kills me.