Ol' Stinky

Nah, like Max said, you can change the range to whatever you want (for the aliens outside, anyway). For example, here's a mod that changes light scouts from 2-3 outdoor aliens to 2-6. To install, extract it into your Xenonauts folder; on Steam, this should be something like "C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Xenonauts\".

Thanks for the praise. Could you do me a favour though? Next time you think that a map could use polish, grab a screenshot and put it up here (Imgur seems to work fine for hosting pictures, and no sign-up is required). I won't be offended or anything, I promise. (:

Maybe light and heavy drones could have their suppression radius reduced instead of suppression value. Currently it's 4/3/5 for light/medium/heavy. How about 3/3/4 instead?

Isn't it a 100% chance to block from the front 45 degrees at the moment? If shield guys are getting shots bypassed, then the shots are coming from an angle where they're not certain to absorb hits. Maybe it's time for shields to not fit in backpacks. You can still get more shields than you're intended if you're really dedicated, but a) it's a pain in the bum to set up and b) it's a pain in the bum to make use of. In my view, shields are there in place of the OG X-Com rookies you'd lose by scouting, so that you don't have to use a vehicle (with its +2 vision) to scout safely. I don't want to lose the 100% block from the front, though, as it was really lame to lose a scout because you failed the dice roll.

There should be absolutely no issues with using map packs from different authors. The only time that'd happen is if two mapmakers use the same name for submaps, which is very unlikely. The community map pack and Stinky pack 2 work with v21 but don't follow the official guidelines. For example, the light scout maps will be bigger than the official maps (60x60 versus 50x50). Skitso's maps work with v21 and are good. Download them. You might pick up on map making styles, but there's no way to display the current map name ingame, sadly. Grumble grumble mutter mutter. The maps themselves should end up in ...\Xenonauts\assets\maps\[tileset name]. So farm maps will be in ...\Xenonauts\assets\maps\farm\. With mine you point the .zip to your Xenonauts folder, wherever that might be (NOT the one in mydocs where saves are kept, but the one in, say, your Steam folder). With others, like Skitso's, you might extract into Xenonauts\assets\. It'll say in their OP.

It looks like Stable's closing in on us, so I want to drop a note off here: these maps will run on v21, but some are above the intended map sizes. I recommend playing with default and Skitzo's map packs (linked by Max two posts above me) before using the community map pack; if the idea of some bigger maps in there doesn't bother you, go ahead and download. For example, my light scout maps included in the community pack are 60x60 while v21 official light scout maps will be 50x50.

I get that for urls proper, but if it's text and not a link (see Gaud's post helping me out) it seems a bit pointless...? It's one thing to accidently click on a link, and another to accidently copy and paste text somewhere. Anyway, thanks for the help. Now for my daily struggle with putting my trousers on the right way 'round, and making sure my socks match.

Oh, thank you. I saw that the file had gone and started screaming and flailing my arms. My heart beat's still at a million per second, but I'm calming down now. P.S. Why do the forums put in spaces in written-down links sometimes? It's done that to me before as well.

Yeah, farm's one of the hardest tilesets. Desert and arctic are probably the easiest ones. My first farm maps were disastrous.

I need someone to send an ambulance to 28 Stink Drive, Stinkdon, Greater Stinksbury, ST1 NKY. The quick battle function seems to have gone and I am suffering a heart attack.

End of turn explosion made the massive amount of suppression pretty pointless, except as a way to accidently suppress your own guys. I used flashbangs and stun gas instead back when ES was end-of-turn. I'd rather have ES stun damage lowered than end-of-turn put back in. Less stun damage means that ES doesn't eclipse both stun gas and frag-type grenades. ES also got a buff in the removal of spash damage dropoff, which might be affecting its numbers. I don't know how I'd feel about them becoming manufactured items. My first thought is that if we make some grenades have a finite supply, why not others? It's not immediately obvious that frag grenades will destroy equipment, and that mechanic's in there to stop people hurling grenades at everything behind cover, all the time. We don't use the workshop at the very start of the game anyway, so one of the tutorials can be to used the workshop to produce frag grenades. Fluff wise, say that these particular grenades are an experimental type and so are in limited supply. Edit: I think the old bug I mentioned didn't affect stun gas, actually, so I edited that out.

You'll get some people like that, sure. Others will skip it because it's fluff after the first few reports, or they'll figure everything is obvious. Reapers who turn victims into zombies and Wraiths who teleport are examples of what I mean by "obvious". On the other hand Sebs seeing through smoke, Harridans with high reflexes, and probably others are harder to pick up on.

Only if ES are meant to be on the same level as flashbangs. I see ES as the replacement for FBs, so have ESs replace FBs when the research is complete, the same way alenium grenades replace common frags.

There should be something that tells newbies to actually read the autopsies. A loading screen tip's the most obvious idea. Otherwise the forum's going to have a lot of "smoke seems useless!" and "Androns are bugged, I can't suppress them!" threads when the game's properly released.

No-one thinks your proposals are wrong because you're making them. Please don't take the discussions here personally, because there will be times that people disagree with you. There's going to be a Soviet weapon mod (I wonder what other mods will ship with the game? There's an "advanced start" folder in the mod directory) but it's hard enough to balance the weapons we've already got, throwing a whole load of variants in will make it that much harder.

I was going to mess with it but it didn't seem worthwhile because of this wiki existing: http://xenonauts.wikia.com/wiki/Xenonauts_Wiki I do hope that some of the old wiki survives. The explanation of game mechanics and mapping/submapping have been very helpful, even if some of it is out of date.

Isn't that intentional?

Did you ever try this? I've assumed it could cause a crash. A way to tie spawns together ("if UFO spawns in NE then dropship spawns in SW, if UFO spawns in NW then dropship spawns in SE") would be fantastic, but the suggestion is probably causing a vein to buldge in a dev's forehead.

I'm nodding and making general noises of agreement at the screen.

A key that highlights items on the ground, and draws them above anything else around would be nice. I'm thinking along the lines of the bright red alien effect when you click on an "enemy spotted" icon.

Yeah, although I've always liked the effect of 10 bullet bursts. (I still think 6 pellet shotguns look better than 3 pellet shotguns as well. Just sayin'.) Ramp up the recoil some more and if that fails, make the penalty more severe. It seems fitting that STR is key to using an LMG.

But if you wanted to modifiy what the cops from indus or the soldiers from desert use, you're out of luck. Right?

While mucking about with night time settings, I really liked the way vision dims at the edge of LoS (assuming no light source). Not only does it look atmospheric as all hell, but it neatly demonstrates a unit's line of sight. Is there any way this visual effect could be incorporated into daytime combat, too?

You can change how many local forces appear easily enough, as it's a map setting. You'd need to distinguish your maps from the official ones for obvious reasons, but the process is as easy as copy and pasting .xml files and then changing the number of friendlies. Although frankly, with higher numbers of units running around, it sounds as though you'd be better off making mod-specific maps - which you can do with the map maker that comes with the game. The only problem you might run into is editing the local forces' loadout. Right now they spawn with different loadouts depending on the map's tileset. Industrial UFO recoveries will have cops with pistols and shotguns, while Middle Eastern maps will have soldiers with AKs, and farm maps will have Farmer Jim and his trusty shotgun. If you don't like the sound of those loadouts, I think you might be out of luck, at least right now: if there's a way to replace Farmer Jim with a soldier, I don't know it.

Yes, yes I can. (: That music took me back instantly. I loved Settlers 2, it's neat that someone pulled off that multiplayer hack. The hotseat multiplayer that was hacked into OG X-Com didn't have a geoscape for the aliens iirc. Player 2 only got to fight in ground combat. I'd be more than happy with that.