maackey

Technicians are useless in the early game when you don't have anything to build, but you'll need a lot to keep up with production if you want reasonable build times. My advice is to only start hiring them when you need lots of buildpower. I have no idea how research works -- my first impression was that research scales linearly with the number of scientists, but I haven't done any timing tests to verify one way or the other. Currently they are pretty useless. Everything up until landing ships you can take out easily with 3 condors (provided you have researched alenium weaponry), and even after that, Foxtrots can't fight other fighters. I personally only send them out vs unescorted large ships, or after I've sent a squadron of fighters to take down the escort. I wouldn't think you'd need more than 3, or 6 total if you've got a base on the other side of the world. But I'd mostly stick with condors -- they are cheaper, have cannons, and can roll. It is currently bugged so aliens don't attack it, so in that sense it can be abused pretty heavily. It has decent armor and stats, headlights for night missions, and the laser cannon is pretty decent. Its a toss up depending on your playstyle, really. I built one to test it out and it mostly hangs back in base for defense missions, but its also good backup for when troops get wounded and can't go outside and play. Alenium explosives is #1 priority to the exclusion of all else when it becomes available. Aside from that my priority is armor, alien tech, ground weapons, then vehicles. Others may have different priorities, I don't think the order you research stuff in is terribly important, personally, with the exception of alenium explosives which grant damage bonuses to basically *everything* that explodes: grenades, rockets, sidewinders, torpedoes (benefiting both ground and air) I've started assigning all my rookies with a custom class: Mook. No armor, lots of grenades, a rifle, shotgun, stun baton and medipack. If they survive to get some skills I'll assign them to a more important role like sniper/heavy/rocketeer, and like yourself, they are generally limited to two per squad of eight troops. Smoke grenades block LOS. They are generally even better for breaching ships than flashbangs IMO, and even better when combined with flash. They can also be used to cloak your guys caught out in the open and save their lives. Frags are a poor man's rocket launcher. Generally any time you'd use a rocket, but don't have one, you can use a frag grenade (if you are close enough). Stun grenades are useless, better to just use the baton if you want live aliens. If you can get the plasma research fast enough I'd say go for it, plasma is better in every way. The only problem is that you need to acquire some piece of alien technology before you can start research on it, and alien tech drops randomly. I haven't used upgraded pistols yet so no comment. My experienced troops get armor. The more experienced, the better the armor. Experienced troops generally have a lot more strength, so can carry armor with heavier loads better, so except in the extreme situations, I disregard what weapon they are mainly using and give them armor based on seniority. Buzzard is supposedly a flying suit, useful for scouting, but I've never built it, so I can't really comment on it. I immediately build a second base in north America (initial one in middle east) which is a fully functional base, with interceptors, chinook, living quarters, troops, manufacturing plants + technicians, the only thing it doesn't have is labs + scientists because that can all be done in the main base. Any other bases I may have are generally for radar coverage/UFO interception. I typically build mine up as soon as I have the money for it, keeping ~50k in reserve for emergencies. Money in your bank account doesn't help kill aliens. I wouldn't destroy old ships, as they are quite expensive, but rather send them to a remote base so they can be used for backup/quicker encounters. I like to have at least one empty hangar to transfer ships into/out of. Typically it is in the base with my best engineering capabilities, so they can build a new plane immediately, and then build a spare hanger for it somewhere else. As for the total count of interceptors, that's up to you, really. Just keep in mind that you can only send a maximum of 3 ships per sortie. researching advanced thrusters? which is only available after you acquire a certain alien artifact drop (which happens randomly) I have never seen it before late January. Rocket launchers. Also, like I mentioned before, tanks kept at the base are quite useful for defending, and they can also be sent on alien base missions. I've always felt the ability to hold my own, so I'm not sure. Like in the original XCOM, losses are to be expected. Are you losing all your missions or something? I generally stick with 10 per base, until I get the upgraded chopper, which I then add more. I generally find my rookies being rotated due to veteran injuries, so its kind of a non-issue for me, but a good idea regardless. Have you tried smoke grenades and stun batons? No idea.

To provide some context for those unfortunate souls who might not know about KSP: Its LEGOs in space. P.S. The LEGOs are explosive and contain little green aliens. What more can a dedicated Xenonauts fan ask for?

For the most part, no. Short games that are easy to complete of course I will finish, and I've even played to the end some serious sit down games like Baldur's Gate and Total War. However, if I lose interest, or the game starts to become a chore I simply stop playing. Achievements, progress bars and final cutscenes aren't powerful motivators for me, personally. When I can feel myself being part of a virtual Skinner box I have a hard time trying to ignore bad/boring/tedious game mechanics. Although I think a lot of it has to do with developers trying to make a game around a story, rather than a story around a game. Games like chess I can come back to and play over and over -- it has no story, no achievements, no progress bars, no extra fluff, just a few hours of strategic fun. Not to say that those things are bad, just that the core gameplay doesn't need those things to be successful. Zero-K is a RTS game I've worked on which started off with no story, achievements, etc. and I've clocked in hundreds of hours playing the game. It has since gained a few new trinkets -- custom commanders, experience and unlocks, a simple story -- but the core gameplay is what keeps drawing me back to it, because it keeps being fun.

I think it has little to do with the weapon and is more about the fact that the ammunition is so fragile that it isn't practical in real-world situations.

Complimenting Xenonauts by dismissing another game is false praise, and doesn't do any good IMO. All the GTA games I've played have been phenomenal -- the main story missions may be linear and a bit morose (as intended by the developers), but the main missions are a small fraction of the game if that isn't your cup of tea. Besides, comparing GTA to Xenonauts is like comparing apples to oysters -- they are nothing alike so their flaws and strengths are completely dissociated from the other game entirely.

Foxtrots are only viable vs ships that cannot roll at all. I don't even bring them if there are escorts as they are just a liability.

I've played a bit of Rome II, and then gave up and went back to Roma Surrectum II (complete overhaul mod for the original Rome) because I got so bored. I haven't noticed any major graphical improvements from Shogun II, it is pretty enough, but the AI is abhorrent and the units move so fast that battles are literally over in 3-4 minutes. 3 minute battles combined with 3 minute turn lengths on the giant map that is made mostly of filler forests/mountains/seas gets tiring, especially because they've streamlined the armies and cities so much that you don't really have to think about much of anything on the campaign map. I've literally spent more time waiting for the turns to pass than actually playing the game -- battles and campaign map time combined! Gah, sorry. Rant over. I like the original Rome, but can't really play it without mods (eg. RSII). I play all the rest from time to time (although I've never actually played Napolean, even though I bought it in a pack with all the rest) depending on whether I'm feeling a bit master and commander, or perhaps if I want to take back the mines of Moria, or a bit sanguine watching samurai go at eachother.

Yeah, you're probably right that its easier for the middle ship to run away, but landing ships IMO are even easier than light scouts as you don't have to even stagger missiles, so I don't really mind playing "dodge the missile" on my one plane. One thing I think could really improve the air combat is to get rid of all the overlapping line of fire indicators. Perhaps have them only displayed when the ship is selected, and/or maybe display an outline (eg. a V shape only) because the hardest thing right now is dodging shots. Part of the difficulty in that is the fast pace of the air combat when not paused, and the other is that you can't see anything in the occluded mess of aiming areas.

I was inspired by Dranak's video and decided to make one myself: [video=youtube;WFk882UPCyo] Hopefully it helps!

Haha, well I'm glad I was wrong This is pretty cool.

I'm really excited to see the UI overhaul, and the new base goodies!

I use pistols in two roles: sniper and assault (shield). The pistol is the only ranged weapon that lets you hurl grenades quickly (~20 TU's) and is the only ranged weapon usable with shields. I meant that it shouldn't be multiplied directly to everything else. Range isn't all about the amount of energy you put into a shot -- yes it is a factor, but the special optics and the quality of manufacturing of the weapon I would imagine have a much greater effect, independent of battery power. An analogy would be a spud gun and the air pressure -- more pressure doesn't equate to more range after a certain point. In your equation a gun with half the range of another one would be able to fire two, full strength shots for every one of the longer ranged gun - atmospheric interference is *not* that strong. Besides, the pistol is not meant to be a long range weapon. I don't like giving it that extra range. It is most effective in close combat, where you can fire off lots of shots at close enemies very quickly. It seems silly to give it lots of extra range -- that is what rifles are for.

I don't really think range should be multiplied into the equation that way. I would preferably look at just a simple damage/magazine ratio for each of the weapons. Laser pistol: 30 damage / 6 shots = 180 dmg/mag Laser carbine: 30 damage / 18* shots = 540 dmg/mag Laser rifle: 45 damage / 9 shots = 405 dmg/mag Laser sniper: 75 damage / 4 shots = 300 dmg/mag Laser scatter: 53 damage / 15* shots = 795 dmg/mag Plasma pistol: 45 damage / 6 shots = 270 dmg/mag Plasma carbine: 45 damage / 18* shots = 810 dmg/mag Plasma rifle: 70 damage / 9 shots = 630 dmg/mag Plasma sniper: 113 damage / 4 shots = 452 dmg/mag Plasma scatter: 80 damage / 15* shots = 1200 dmg/mag The results are similar as expected but I think damage per magazine is a bit more of a useful metric than battery power. I wholeheartedly agree that pistols are woefully underpowered; the same magazine plugged into a scatter plasma has more than 4x the damage output! However I disagree on the solution. A simple buff to 12 shots for each pistol magazine would be sufficient. laser pistol with 12 shots = 360 dmg/mag plasma pistol with 12 shots = 540 dmg/mag As you can see these values align with the ballistic tendencies for pistols to have more ammunition, and the later technologies having overall less shots per magazine, while still keeping them at a reasonable overall strength. The heavy weapons requiring larger (or multiple) batteries I like. Otherwise IMO just buff the number of shots per pistol up to 12.

+1 They can't even stun a noncombatant Caesan holed up in the scout reliably within a couple turns. I did manage to take one down after 6 grenades and 4 turns, but I now just throw a couple flashbangs and use a shock baton if I want any aliens alive. (The stun baton is lighter, and doesn't even take up much more space with the inventory overlap bug) I thought that the gas grenades were supposed to have more gas/cloud spread to make up for their reduced initial damage. As it is right now they can't even fill up a 3x3 square, I'd prefer if they filled up a 5x5 square completely, given the same amount of stun damage they do now.

Blueberry Muffin Strawberry Shortcake Lemon Bar Chocolate Chip Cookie

The game is still in development. Until it is released, it doesn't make much sense to compress everything, as to make necessary changes you'd need to uncompress, edit the file, recompress, rinse and repeat. That is a lot of overhead time wasted to save a couple GBs of space. Storage is cheap, and unless you have fairly old, crappy internet, 4-5 GB isn't very taxing either. Its not like you have to download the whole game each time updates are released either... only differential changes are downloaded. Besides, there are better ways to save size with compression & optimization. I'm not too keen on the specifics but .dds and other file formats which can be natively used by GPUs are much better for performance. Compressed pngs would have to be uncompressed somewhere along the line, which slows down the game -- I'd rather have a larger game that runs faster than a smaller one which takes longer to load, but thats just me.

This happened as well to another youtuber here: Problems started in episodes 8 with a bugged base attack (alien tunnels spawning in the blackness of space) and then got worse from there.

Thought it was a known bug by the devs, made a bug report just to be safe though. My soldiers will miss it much more than I will, I bet

I figured this might be a known bug, but just for completeness I'd thought I'd post here as I didn't see any other bug reports about it and it is extremely exploitable. How to reproduce: 1.) Get LOS into a room (open a door, then close it for safety) 2.) Stand back from the wall a tile or more just to be extra safe (safety is the main point of this exploit) 3.) Fling grenades at the aliens to your heart's content, without fear of deadly reaction fire. This is especially useful vs light scouts -- I can fill a room up with stun gas and get all the extra points and goodies that go along with captured aliens without risking anybody, all it takes is enough stun grenades or flashbangs to suppress those inside before I open up and shock them with my beating stick. Regular grenades work as well if you don't mind damaging equipment or would rather polymorph the deadly aliens into harmless piles of goop. Alien bases and other ships are also prone to this type of exploitation. I personally don't mind it too much as my troops keep coming home alive and the game is already difficult enough as it is assaulting small chokepoints which are present in all the alien features, but balancing can come after the bugs are polished off I suppose...

Yes, but a very handy one atm

yes, they crouch while hiding behind objects

Talking about exploits, being able to throw grenades over "enclosed" walls (into alien bases, ships and other buildings) is quite effective at killing those hard to get those campers just inside the door.

I start my second base off with just interceptors, but soon after I add a chinook and it ends up being a fully functional mop up base for all the UFO's in the Americas. I just add my workshops and labs to my first base, it has plenty of room. I've built a third base before mainly just to try and detect/shoot down UFO's in Australasia, but haven't gotten too far in the game due to updates interrupting my save files. I'm sure the game is winnable with only one base, I just like multiples so I get the radar range and as many crashsites as possible. But the devs are balancing around not doing every crashsite, so... yeah, shouldn't be that big a deal as long as you get the guys you see. I could be terribly wrong though, as I've never done one base before, might be interesting to try...

I know the cyberdisks still do, they quite remind me of a... hot plate (and are shortly after shattered, much like a regular plate after my niece gets hold of it)

The increased damage for individual shots is definitely working as intended, but I find myself *never* using burst shots because I can't reliably suppress anything. Especially now that 2 of the 3 alien types I see most are either extremely resistant or completely immune to suppression altogether. If I'm close enough for burst fire to be effective, I'm close enough to stun them with a stun rod -- which not only is more effective and safer, it gives me more points for increased funding. There are a few instances where I'd use burst fire, namely if I'm close, don't have a stun rod or don't want to run out of cover, don't have any grenades or don't want to destroy equipment, if the alien is immune to everything else (looking at you, androns), and probably some others. Overall I think the cost vs. effectiveness is fine as is, but I wouldn't mind seeing just a *slight* buff, in either TU reduction, suppression, or accuracy, because I literally never use it unless I'm in melee range -- the other shot types are nearly double the expected damage per TU.