[Khall's Tundra Tileset]

I'll see if I can add the original outline to the props, when I used an overlay the first time I forgot to take into account the outline as well. I'll also play around some more with contrast and saturation.

I'm in the process of making the grass less snowy, it's around half of the current grass and the original soviet. I tried in the past to make the snow more variable, but when it came to fitting the ground submaps together, the edges didn't match, or if I left the edges alone, it was really noticeable where the submap ended. But with the grass texture showing through more, it should look a bit less flat.

The trees are still a bit too snowy, so I'll trying increasing the saturation more and make the snow greener and less bright, but there's only so much I can do with that snow texture and make it look natural.

I'll post some images later on my progress

There's not much else in the tileset at the moment but once I fix the current issues and add more rural props more maps would be great

[Khall's Tundra Tileset]

Thanks everyone

Yeah, I remember you saying it was meant be rural soviet style when it was discussed ages ago, so I've been keeping that in mind. I also wanted to make it a little different than the soviet tileset, and with only arctic trees fitting the style (which i've tried to look less snowy), led to me making the ground look colder, and therefore also the props. Rural villages are what i'll be working on next, which will be eventually be the main identity for the tileset, with the current random forests and later on military bases to provide some variety. But they'll require more ground tiles such as roads, which takes a while to alter (the basic pale green grass in the tileset is just soviet grass with a semi-transparent overlay of artic snow, but it consists of 100 tiles and spectres which i did individually). I did forests first because it takes the least effort to produce a good amount of variation, just using a lot of random submaps. I've tried to differentiate the current forest maps from arctic forest by having them more densely filled with props (bushes, logs, etc.) and I'll see about adding that tall grass from the farm tileset to make it look more wild, so its a more unique experiance.

Any feedback about the maps or how i can improve tiles would be greatly appreciated (I think i might add grass around tree stumps, it looks a bit too clean at the moment)

[Help! Switching off Industrial entirely?]

A bit off-topic, but I just noticed that the "tundra" tileset is listed in the key to the continent masks. I'd previously spotted the tundra tileset in the mapping/tiles folder but as it's unused, I figured there wouldn't be any ability to integrate it.

However, since it's listed on the key I wonder whether the game still supports the tundra tileset even though the game isn't using it. If it does, it would be possible to add an entirely new tileset into the game. (Totally wish I was an artist, now).

I suppose I have to thank you for giving me the idea to implement the tundra tileset, I never knew it was still in the continent masks

http://www.goldhawkinteractive.com/forums/showthread.php/10627-Khall-s-Tundra-Tileset

[Khall's Tundra Tileset]

Since the proposed tundra tileset never made it into the final game, I decided to make my own and fully integrate the already partially implemented tileset. Now this tileset isn't fully complete, I've just added outdoor forest and wooden cabin props so far, but there's enough to allow me to publish it. The civilians and local forces used in this are taken from the Soviet tileset. Props used are "tundra-fied" (making artic trees less snowy, adding frost to farm logs, etc.) versions of props taken from other tilesets. I've updated the tileset masks on the geoscape, so mainly Canada and upper Eurasia have tundra, at the expense of less industrial (which is the most common tileset anyway).

I've made 2 maps for each ufo size (lightscout, small, medium, large). That might not sound like a lot, but they are forest themed (which a few people have been requesting on the forums in the past ), which allowed me to construct them out of loads of random variants of submaps, so no map should be the same twice. I also created some variants of wooden cabins, but I've not had much time to expand on it yet. As the maps are random forests and are quite cramped, they probably wont be suited for vehicles, and saving for reaction fire is highly recommended against ambushing enemies. There is quite a lot of cover in the maps, but they disintegrated very quickly after a few shots, so vision blocking props (e.g. trees) are your safest bet. Maps have been made with Goldhawk standards in mind. I am not the best mapmaker, this is only to give you an idea of potential.

In the long term, I plan on:

- "Tundra-fying" more props

- "Tundra-fy" more ground tiles, I've only got snowy soviet grass at the moment (this takes a lot of time, it'll be a while before I have roads included)

- Create more diverse maps, such as military bases or rural villages

Some images:

Of course, anyone can use the assets in the mod to create their own maps, there a lot of better and more experienced map makers out there, but please use the current tiles in the tundra folder, don't mix and match props from other tilesets, or if its really necessary, copy the tile images and spectre into the "copies" folder in the tundra tileset, and edit the spectre accordingly(make sure the spectre paths to the images in the tundra/copies/ folder, and not the previous path). It just makes it easier if a compilation of maps is done further down the line.

Versions:

V1.0: Initial tileset

V1.1: Overhauled the look of the tileset, added tall grass

V1.2: Added road, vehicles, rural tiles, 2 rural maps for light scout and scout/corvette

Enjoy

Download link (V1.1):

https://www.dropbox.com/s/fb91wkio5t65fks/Khall%27s%20Tundra%20Tileset.rar

[Khall's Carbines/Shotguns + Extras Mod]

This mod adds the carbine weapon type back into the game, using existing carbine assets, and the existing shotgun role uses new assets.

Carbines are lighter, shorter range versions of rifles, trading effectiveness at longer ranges for higher rate of fire and mobility. Carbines use new sounds and current carbine sprites in ground combat.

Stats (brackets are rifle stats)Weight: 3kg (5kg)

Reload cost: 20TU (25TU)

Ammo: 20 (20)

Range: 15 (20)

Only 3 Aim modes: Snapshot TU 22% ACC 40% (Snapshot TU 28% ACC 45%)

Normal TU 30% ACC 70% (Normal TU 40% ACC 80%)

Burst TU 40% ACC 40% (Burst TU 55% ACC 45%)

Damage: 5/6 of equivalent rifle damage

Has 1.5x reaction modifier

Shotguns are largely the same except:

Pellets: 6 (from 3)

Damage per pellet: 3/5 of original damage

Weight: 4kg (from 3kg)

Has 1x reaction modifier (from 1.5x)

This means an overall increase in damage and reliability, at expense of 1.5x reaction modifier and slight increase in weight. Upgraded shotguns now use the new assets and sounds, using the equivalent rifle sprite in ground combat.

Other changes:

• AK47 now replaces ballistic rifle, with modified sound and using the AK47 ground combat sprites
  
• M16_short is used for the ballistic carbine, with modified sound and using the default rifle ground combat sprites
  
• Incendiary grenades have been added, using modified art and projectiles of stun grenade
  
• New rocket projectiles for upgraded rockets
  
• New xenopedia images for each weapon tier
  
• Alien weapons now use different projectiles depending on type
  

Some images

Let me know if there's any problems, it's likely I forgot to do something

Credit to Lt_Parsons for creating the original shotgun images, of which I modified slightly.

V1.06 compatible

https://www.dropbox.com/s/3cxgz6teikzhsau/Khall%27s%20Carbine%2C%20Shotgun%20%2B%20extras%20mod.rar

[Condition: Black (Alien Weapons mod)]

For Wraiths, maybe a grenade that does a small amount of damage, suppresses and creates a small, opaque, gas cloud around the impact point. The idea to limit the visibility and mobility of the xenonauts, so it can use it's teleport more effectively. Though it might overlap somewhat with the sebillian toxin grenades, maybe remove the opaqueness of the toxin grenade and just reduce accuracy through it

Another idea for harridans is mini-grenades, low incendiary damage, small radius, cheap throw costs, extended throw range and give harridans 3 or 4 of them. Increase projectile speed and have no delay for the explosion for a better feel. Used primarily to get through cover so they can use their superior markmanship. Of course you would have to make sure they dont spam them and only use them if they dont have a good enough chance to hit with guns

Also, how are the grenades distributed? To all ranks, or a chance that an alien will spawn with them? If an alien has 2 types of grenades will it throw a random one?

[Condition: Black (Alien Weapons mod)]

Maybe an alien version of C4 for harridans, with a 1 turn delay, if the AI can handle it. Might not be possible, if the timer has to done manually

[Condition: Black (Alien Weapons mod)]

Nice work!

The only way i can think of to rebalance alien resistance towards fire is to e.g. Lower the incendiary bonus against props, increase all incendiary damage and add incediary armour to aliens. But explosions also use incendiary, and no doubt there would have to be more finetuning, but it is something to think about.

Also, stun grenades (in the style of electroshocks) would be a good addition to ceasans. You could say they are used in abductions and if one of your soldiers are knocked out you can revive them with a medkit, finally giving that feature a use

[Ground Combat Balance - V21 Experimental 6]

There already is art for the PSG1 in the game files under weapons/ballistic/alternative. There are also other art and soviet weapons there for anybody interested.
e.g.

[AI Bugs, Improvements & Suggestions]

Tech. Info

v21 Experimental Build 4, balance update

Observed Behavior

Light drones are too passive, they don't fire unless right next to a target.

Desired Behavior

In line with their role as a supportive suppresion unit, they should always fire whenever possible, regardless of hit chance, and try to stay at long range

[Reworking stun]

With the medkit's new ability to revive unconscious soldiers to be useful, we need to be actually have unconscious soldiers. My suggestion is for all alien weapons to have stun damage slightly higher than normal damage.

E.G. Alien pistol of 55 damage and 60 stun damage vs 60 health human

- If pistol rolls less than 100%, human is wounded but still conscious

- If pistol rolls between 100% and 110%, human is wounded and knocked unconscious

- If pistol rolls over 110%, human is dead

Compared to current:

Alien pistol of 55 damage and 0 stun damage vs 60 health human

- If pistol rolls less than 110%, human is wounded but still conscious

- If pistol rolls over 110%, human is dead

As you can see, this does not reduce the killing power of the alien weapons, but means heavily wounded soldiers will be knocked unconscious. They will still be in danger because aliens now shoot at unconscious soldiers (I think that was in patch notes recently), even more so if they are bleeding out.

For humans I would make their weapons have stun damage slightly lower than normal damage. This ensures that without proper stun equipment, you will kill the alien before you knock it unconscious. And I would make stun weapons weaker in general, so that it is hard to stun aliens purely with stun weapons.

And I'm not sure if this is in, but stun damage should regenerate 25% per turn, up to a units current HP. This makes it more difficult to capture aliens without shooting them a bit first.

[V21 Ex4 Balance Requests]

Yeah, the carbines used to be carbines, but they were changed to shotguns a while back. You could mod them back to SMG weapons and keep shotguns using the artwork of this old mod (I know this is off topic and I apologise)

The problem with changing the heavy plasma to an MG, is that we'll lose an alien shotgun weapon, which even though it is vastly overused, is unique, they don't have anything else like it . Anyway I always thought of the light drone as the alien equivalent for an MG. That's why I proposed keeping the single shot function like a shotgun, but making the burst fire much more suppressive and inaccurate (ideally with normal projectiles, not pellets, but I'm not sure that's possible), so it can also function as a MG. With heavy plasma currently being the default weapon for most of the game, it should be a lot more versatile.

Of course we could change the default weapon to the plasma rifle, but you would need to make sure it remains a threat throughout the mid-game, and most higher-level aliens don't have sprites for it.

[V21 Ex4 Balance Requests]

I would like to see a "concussive" type grenade for caesans, that is non lethal, but does a lot of stun damage and suppression. Having your soldiers stunned by aliens would make the medkits' new ability to revive them more important. Plus you can justify it lore-wise by saying it is a tool used primarily for abductions.

Maybe an alien version of C4, that does more damage and has a larger radius than a grenade, but gives you a turn to get away (or throw it back?), either way you have to react to it. Could be for harridans or wraiths?

And I agree about heavy plasma, by mid game all aliens ever seem to carry is the alien shotguns, which is a specialised weapon, making them useless outside close range. Plasma Rifles need to stick around longer, maybe make them scale better by increasing their armour penetration and slightly decreasing damage, so they are still a threat to later armours

And the alien plasma cannon, can we make as lethal as the xenopedia says, many times my soldiers wearing wolf have survived a direct hit. Increase damage and armour penetration, but make it very inaccurate and increase TU cost. Most of the time you'll still take damage from the blast, but a direct hit will happen rarely (but will instagib you if you're not wearing predator)

[V21 Ex4 Balance Requests]

Alien variety: Aliens don't feel as differentiated as they could be. For example, both the Sebillian and Andron feel bullet-spongy and while that's for different reasons, while playing in veteran you don't see why they're bullet spongy - just that they're bullet spongy. I'm sure everyone has their own idea of how each race should be represented (Stinky, for example, has had some success by making every Caesan psychic but limiting the psychic powers severely except for Psions and Officers/Leaders), but would it be possible to see a more marked, non-subtle difference in aliens? To go back to Stinky's example, if every Caesan has a psychic power, that's a very obvious way that Caesans are different to every other race.

For sebillians, we could have the regenerating health appear above the alien (like when you heal a soldier) along with the healing effect. Maybe increase the regeneration (if its working at the moment?) and have slightly more health and less armour than androns, which should be pure tankiness. Would make them more obviously distinct, especially with damage numbers enabled. Makes it more clear why each are hard to kill, seeing hits on sebillians, with them just regenerating the health next turn, compared to seeing hits on androns for little damage.

More grenade types for aliens: Aaron spoke a while back about giving Sebbies poison gas grenades. If each racial type had their own special kind of grenade as well as the standard grenade that would really help to differentiate the alien types. You have plenty of in-game assets that could be used (lots of types of smoke and explosions!). If it's a question of artwork that's holding you back, heck, I'll pay for it!

On that note, can we have an upgraded version of the flashbang. Late game it becomes kinda useless and there's nothing else to fill that niche (apart from electroshock, but they explode end of turn). Maybe tie it in with an alien analysis research, like the sebillians and advanced medkits (its the only one that gives you something other than an 10% damage boost)

[V21 Ex4 Balance Requests]

-(Copied and pasted from other thread) I think putting cover percentages back up to their original values would be a good idea. Decreasing movement costs was meant to promote flanking, but there's no need for if cover isn't that effective anyway. The increase in overall accuracy punishes players that leave units exposed (good idea) and already more shots would be on target on a unit behind cover than the previous accuracy values, which would demolish the cover quicker than before, therefore I think decreasing the cover save of cover is a bit overkill. Entrenched units should be hard to take out without flanking, explosives or sniper rifles (the high accuracy of the upper aim levels would negate most of the cover bonus, which would also give them a niche beside hypervelocity). And it would bring back the firefight feelings of previous versions without decreasing the atmosphere of lethality be reducing accuracy.

Right now its a bit frustrating to have troops regularly taken out with one shot behind cover, it seems like the only way to avoid casualties it to end turn out of alien LOS.

-Reduce TU cost of assault rifle burst fire to 30 and maybe increase its accuracy. This makes burst mode more mobile and viable in CQC

-Increase damage and radius of grenades, but make them less accurate (and maybe increase TU cost). They seem to be a crutch right now, where you can throw a grenade and be near certain it will land on the tile you were aiming for, for reliable damage. I think that you should be primarily relying on blast radius for damage, instead of accuracy and the grenade hitting point blank, but a grenade at your feet should instagib you. Increasing radius would also make them better for room clearing and against groups of enemies. Also, with the new reaction system, increasing TU costs would mean throwing grenades would leave you vulnerable to reaction fire.

-Reduce Jackal weight and manufacturing time, maybe slightly increase wolf weight

-Increase Scatter laser ammo to 30, or decrease reloading costs

-Just an idea, but make the burst mode on heavy plasma very inaccurate, but do loads of suppression. 9 plasma bolts coming at you should be scary, and my soldiers hardly ever get suppressed

-Not really balancing, but can you make suppression act like the damage falloff model, instead of no suppression outside the weapon range

[Ground Combat Balance Discussion - V21 Experimental Balance Patch!]

I think putting cover percentages back up to their original values would be a good idea. Decreasing movement costs was meant to promote flanking, but there's no need for if cover isn't that effective anyway. The increase in overall accuracy punishes players that leave units exposed (good idea) and already more shots would be on target on a unit behind cover than the previous accuracy values, which would demolish the cover quicker than before, therefore I think decreasing the cover save of cover is a bit overkill. Entrenched units should be hard to take out without flanking, explosives or sniper rifles (the high accuracy of the upper aim levels would negate most of the cover bonus, which would also give them a niche beside hypervelocity). And it would bring back the firefight feelings of previous versions without decreasing the atmosphere of lethality be reducing accuracy.

Right now its a bit frustrating to have troops regularly taken out with one shot behind cover, it seems like the only way to avoid casualties it to end turn out of alien LOS.

[Chris' Amazing Balance Patch V1!]

I was thinking about making the burst fire on heavy plasma function more as a short range suppression tool. Increase it's current suppression by a lot (currently at 30, same as single fire), increase the range (currently at 5) and decrease overall accuracy.

Also could the TU cost for burst fire on assault rifles be lowered, 2 snap shot deal the same amount of suppression for the same cost, at a much higher accuracy.

[Implementing Particle Cannon and DHVRL]

One of the things I find Xenonauts to be lacklustre is in the variation of weaponry. By this I mean that you get every type of weapon at the start (exception: stun weapons and the different types of grenades), with each tier being simply an upgrade over the previous. There are no "unique" (for lack of a better word) weapons.

In the files at the moment there are the assets (images, sounds, animations, etc.) for a particle cannon and DHVRL.

Particle cannon:

This would be the equivalent of an alien plasma cannon. It would be researched around the same time as Predator armour, giving it another weapon type to use instead of machineguns (it already has animations). The weapon should be very heavy, have the heavy weapon penalty and have massive recoil (the stronger the soldier, the more accurate it is) so that though anyone can use it, only extremely strong soldiers or those with predator armour could wield it effectively. Lower radius and damage than the default rocket launcher with plasma rockets (which is the equivilent, i guess),unwieldy and hasn't got the different types of rockets, but has a 4 round battery. It should also have a relatively expensive manufacturing cost for the gun and ammo.

Stats im currently testing with:

<Weapon name="weapon.particlebeam" bulletType="rocket" emptySound="Empty Click 1">	<props range="20" hands="2" recoil="80" weight="12" isHeavy="1" clipSize="4" reloadAPCost="30" reloadSound="Weapon Particle Beam Reload" reactionModifier="1" hpLimit="80" disableDamageScaling="1" />	<SingleShot sound="Weapon Particle Beam Single" delay="1.2" suppressionValue="60" suppressionRadius="4">		<Set1 ap="30" accuracy="40" />		<Set2 ap="40" accuracy="80" />	</SingleShot>	<GUIImage name="gui/weapons/ParticleBeam.png"/>	<GroundImage name="grounditemimages/assault_rifle.png"/>	<Ammos>		<Ammo name="ammo.ballistic.flamethrower" type="energy" damage="150" mitigation="20" isOverdamage="1">		<Projectile spectre="projectiles/alienplasma/PLYellow" speed="1600"/>       		<Impact spectre="particles/aleniumexplosion/aleniumexplosion" radius="2.5" sound="Weapon Plasma Grenade" fireChance="0" smokeChance="10" gasType="GrenadeFragSmoke" />     			</Ammo>	</Ammos></Weapon>

DHVRL

Disposable Hyper Velocity Rocket Launcher, this would be a one shot weapon that does massive damage in a small radius, obliterating most single targets. Quite accurate. It is light enough that each soldier could carry one or two (though at the expense of foregoing other equipment) but has the heavy weapon penalty. This would be an end-game item, obtained around when MAG is researched. Causes overdamage. Each unit should have to be manufactured.

Stats im currently testing with:

<Weapon name="weapon.DHVRL" bulletType="rocket" emptySound="Empty Click 1">	<props range="25" hands="2" recoil="0" weight="6" isHeavy="1" clipSize="1" reloadAPCost="25" reloadSound="Weapon Rocket Launcher Reload" reactionModifier="0" isMonoUse="1" hpLimit="80" disableDamageScaling="1" />	<SingleShot sound="Vehicle Weapon MAC Burst" delay="1.2" suppressionValue="60" suppressionRadius="4">		<Set1 ap="30" accuracy="80" />		<Set2 ap="40" accuracy="100" />	</SingleShot>	<BurstFire/>	<GUIImage name="weapons/misc/DHVRLSopen.png"/>	<GroundImage name="grounditemimages/rocketlauncher.png"/>	<Ammos>		<Ammo name="weapon.rocket.hyper" type="kinetic" damage="200" stunDamage="0" mitigation="50" isOverdamage="1">			<Projectile spectre="projectiles/rocket" speed="1700"/>			<Impact spectre="particles/smallgrenade/small_grenade" radius="1.5" sound="Weapon HV Rocket" fireChance="20" smokeChance="30" gasType="GrenadeFragSmoke" />		</Ammo>	</Ammos></Weapon>

The aim of this suggestion is to add more "interesting" weapons throughout the course of the game to keep it fresh. All the stats or when they should be obtained are guesswork, since ive no idea about the mid or end game balance.

Here's a "proof of concept" video I made using existing assets (apart from the particle cannon projectile)

[video=youtube;p9tGQsDBQL8]

[Invincible Aliens?!?]

Is the sebillian regeneration in yet? It could be that

[cover system]

The standing soldier has to be directly ajacent to the crouching soldier to shoot over him

[Ground Combat Balance Discussion v19 Experimental Build 3]

What I'd like to see for weapons:

1. A distinction (and weapon type addition) between carbines and a low accuracy/high power weapon (like a shotgun). So, a carbine is a quite low weight, low TU weapon with lowered accuracy and slightly lower power than a rifle, yet a shotgun is a normal TU, slightly higher weight, and much higher power/lower range version of a rifle. The "shotguns" have high accuracy but low range, so they are useless outside of like 10-12 tiles. "Plasma shotgun" just sounds so awesome anyway.

Here's link to a mod you might like with some very nice images for higher tier shotguns

http://www.goldhawkinteractive.com/forums/showthread.php/4680-Mod-More-Shotguns

[Max's warehouse of the Unusual and the Strange]

If the flamethrower template was implemented (cant remember if the coding wasn't done or just the animation), this would be a good weapon to use it, with a long and narrow cone.

[Base needs guards]

I've had two terror missions against reapers where I've had near total squad wipe-outs. I tried to get the survivors back to the Chinook, where I found two reapers hiding inside the drop ship. It ended badly. While I applaud the AI, I did near rage-quit.

Just saying the drop ship does get boarded (by reapers anyway).

[Having difficulty adding custom sounds]

Look in sounds_gc, it has the "Weapon <sound>" descriptor and the audio files linked to it. Once you have a look at it it should pretty easy to figure it out.

Edit: ninja'd

[RE: Research Descriptions]

If you mouse over a weapon in the soldier equip screen, you get a description of it and some stats (damage, range, penetration etc.)