Danny Pockets

I removed everything! Nothing is spared! All png files tremble before my wrath! @Gauddlike The jpeg I was referring to was actually the file that was linked to, the transparency. But just removing everything worked fine.

Hi. I tried this and it didn't work for me. The file that you linked to is actually a jpeg, does that affect it? (I did rename it to png, but it's still a jpeg, of course).

Hi. I'll be brief because I don't want to upset my good friend Stella Rat. I hate the hidden movement screen. I hate it. Not because it's not working in the current experimental build. I hate it because it seems like a lot of nonsense to me. I know some others feel the same. But I've also read Chris writing that he was reluctant to change it because it's very X-Com. Having never played the original, I have no particular attachment to things being the same as the original just for the sake of nostalgia. My personal opinion is that simply having the "Alien Turn" writing in white at the top of the screen would be perfect. Rather than mucking about with compromises between the two views points (like the current solution), why not just have an option to toggle between the two? I imagine there are or will be other interfacey-type issues like this (which do not affect gameplay at all), so why not a "Classic Nostalgia" option and then a pared down option which would be how you'd do a modern game if you weren't concerned about being faithful to the original source (much like Enemy Unknown! although I feel a little mean saying that because, you know, points for effort and all that).

Good grief, thothkins! You are the master of puns. (Sorry, I don't have a pun for that). Ok well thank you kindly for the advice. I was hoping to get a third base up but never had the funding for it, but I think having soldiers at only one base, and scrambling for MiGs quicker (so that I don't have to keep replacing Condor's...) might just make all the difference. I just found out about the speed adjustment for aircraft from watching one of steelwarrior's let's plays. What a difference that makes! Man, I need to start paying attention to all the details in this game. I also just found what those big red letters mean when I'm equipping my soldiers... At least I have a game plan for my next play through now. And just in time: I tried going back to Enemy Unknown for a bit of compare and contrast and had to rage quit in disgust (which is totally unlike me...). Now I get why original X Com players were so disappointed with that game. Thanks again!

It sounds like you and I are basically playing the same way: I think we've both read the same posts on this forum. Except I've never bothered with armour because one way or another I always have other costs that seem more important and to be honest that stuff is not very fashionable. I always play on iron man so I can't reload, but to be honest I usually don't lose any soldiers in the tactical missions. My only real problem is running out of funding come December/January. Are you sure you can get away without a second base? How many months in are you usually getting? Thanks for pitching in!

lol I can already feel my popularity and urge to kill rising, rising...

hmm, well i've been playing in iron man, so maybe i should tone that down... And I didn't even know about alien bases! Nice one kreny, thanks!

MiGs. Check. But surely my lack of funds isn't just that the game hasn't been balanced. I mean, other people are getting past January, right? I know they have been ,because I know there's a whole bunch of aliens I haven't seen yet. Something I forgot to mention, I've never managed to stun and capture an alien. So I'm wondering if that would have opened up a bunch of stuff for me. But then if its just more research, I'd still be too strapped to pay for anything any way...

The more you know!

Yeah, I get that a lot.

I sacrificed my best soldiers for you people, and what thanks do I get? Funding cut after funding cut! Why? Because a bunch of hick farmers are complaining about a few sore rectums? Good grief! I'm trying to fight a war here! And now I have to explain to my soldiers' orphaned children that, "sorry, I wanted to buy your parent some armour so I wouldn't have to return their corpse to you in a dozen plastic sandwich bags, but I'm a bit strapped for cash here because some butt sore civilians are upset they got abducted for the weekend and don't think I'm worth funding any more." That's democracy for you! But seriously, I really don't think I know what I'm doing when it comes to the strategic game. My first "successful" playthrough I didn't build a second base and pumped all my cash into buying snazzy weapons and such, but lost too much funding. Probably got to the start of December and then gave up the goose. Second "successful" playthrough, built a second base in the US (probably should've gone for Russia/China), never bought a single upgraded weapon or armour, got to January 1 before funding dried up. Partly, I ended spending a crazy fortune having to replace all my fighters that keep getting blown to pieces (although admittedly I only just discovered how much control you have in that mini-game, e.g. I didn't realise you could actually move your fighters around manually, etc). Full disclosure: I never played the original X Com, so I have no carry-over information from that game. So before I start my third game, I was hoping to get some tips on how to play the strategic game. I've looked around a bit but I couldn't really find any info on that aspect of the game. Some things I'm interested in: Do I need soldiers in my second base? I kitted it out with a full compliment of soldiers and chinook, and then I'm pretty sure I barely ever used them. And so it occurred to me that maybe you just send soldiers out from the original base and the secondary bases are just for air defence. But then what about your base getting invaded (which I haven't experienced yet)? Won't I need soldiers in each base to defend against that? I recently realised that you can set your fighters to patrol the skies? What's up with that? (I haven't done it yet because I've never had enough fighters on hand to be confident to do anything with them except wait for the next round of death from the skies). Speaking of which, should I be racing to get a bunch of Migs up? I usually only have one because in some ways they seem kinda useless, and Condors are super effective for a while, but then when the big boy alien ships turn up I just get owned in the skies, and I'm outta money by then... It's not clear to me when I can safely flog off my stuff to earn money or when I can keep it. In my first game I kept it to use for research and building fancy things, and I ran out of money. Second game, I flogged it off because my second base was so expensive I couldn't afford nice things, any way. And I still ran out of money! And speaking of money, I need more of that! How do I get that? How do I get them to love me!?

The game is kind of sorta kinda rough in places but also totally, totally playable. I've been playing the stable build and only one time did it crash to desk top. There's a few little niggly bits here and there, like throwing grenades, but once you realise how that bug works, you can just work around it during play, so its usually not really an issue. If you "loved" the demo, then I'd just jump right in man. I've been playing less than a month and I've almost clocked 50 odd hours (damn you, Steam!) and to be honest I've found the over-all experience less frustrating and more satisfying than the new Firaxis XCom.

Remember when you were really young, and you were happy all the time? And then someone dies. And you were like, "The fuck was that?" And your parents sit you down and say, "Listen, this is just a part of life. Everybody dies." "Everybody dies? Am I going to die!?" And then you turn to Jesus and you're like, "Dude, I thought we were friends." And Jesus is like, "We're still friends." "You're going to murder me!" "It's not murder. That's just the way of things: It's all part of the plan." "That's what murder is! When you plan to kill someone." "Come on, guy. It's not like that. It's not like I've singled you out for death. Everybody dies." "That doesn't make it better! You are systematically murdering every one who's ever lived. That's not just murder: That's genocide!"

I had a good little chuckle to this. Hopefully we're still not getting our wires crossed, but I'm thinking you've realised that most of what I've been writing is in jest? I do like to kid. Sorry if it caused you a bit of consternation. Actually, people taking me the wrong way has been a constant theme throughout my life. So it's probably my fault after all. That's what my Mum keeps telling me. Oh and the tl:dr part was that I had a whole completely separate issue in the original post that no one addressed, but I think maybe it was an actual bug and I've reposted that second part in the bugs forum. Until next time! Have a good night

I posted this issue as part of a discussion forum post, but I think it was tl:dr and it was ignored. Now that I've gotten over that, I'm going to repost here it because it did feel buggy. I'll just quote from myself, because how do often do you get to quote yourself in life without sounding like a complete ass (don't answer that): What I forgot to add there and which is actually the important part, was that once the Reaper was revealed I immediately moved away the soldier beside it. And when I moved him, that area went back to being blacked out (this was a night mission). So the Reaper was only revealed as the lady soldier came round the chopper to face it, but apparently she did not have sight to it because moving away the closer soldier blacked that area out. But that closer soldier also apparently didn't have line of sight because otherwise why was it only revealed as the second soldier came around. So that seems like a bug to me unless I'm really missing something about how sight works.

I see. Well, this isn't the first time I've been accused trying steal people's attention for myself. But, you know, we've just met, so that's kind of a bit rude of you, wouldn't you agree? Nonetheless it did give me an opportunity to more clearly state the real point that I was driving at. Even though I did just go ahead and repeat it again by quoting someone else. Maybe this is what my Mother means when she says I'm so obnoxiously difficult. Too my face, she says that. And on my birthday!

Ok, thank you Gentleman! Yeah I really couldn't tell what was going on, but for now let's work on the assumption that I was simply spotted by a new alien. Like I say, this was from out of a still blacked area of the map, so the offending alien was at a quite reasonable distance from my soldier. But I believe Harridens (I think that's what their snipers are called, right?) have particularly long sight so let's take this as the simplest explanation. Until next time!

I may have exaggerated slightly, it's hard to remember exactly. But you lol'd, so it's fine. It's just like that time I made that really funny rape joke in court and then the judge had to let me off.

First of all, I've learned that if I want people to read my whole post, I should probably write smaller posts. But seriously, you guys, every word I write is as important as the one that came before it. Maybe even more important! (Well, no, probably only as important...). No I wasn't sure and I addressed that in my post. I was facing Harriden's and so I'm not sure what their sight range is, and I don't know if they can target my soldiers out unrevealed areas of the maps, because they can see that far but my soldiers can't. Can anyone clarify this? On the other hand, does anyone know how squad sight works exactly: specifically, if any alien has seen my soldier, does that mean that every alien can now target that soldier even when he he completely out of sight of the original alien that saw him? This was a desert map without civilians, though, so it wasn't accidental fire that had been aimed at a civilian I couldn't see. I can confirm that Chris has indeed said this, because he said it to me, in a wonderful dream that I had. We we're riding white horses, bareback, along a beach of jet black sand, set against a magnificent amber sunset... But look here, and I'm sorry to repeat myself (even though repetition [is/] fun), but my question was really about the mechanics of squad sight as it currently exists, and this is important (and not just because I'm the one who's saying it). If a soldier is seen by one alien, and then moves out of sight of that alien, does every other alien continue to have squad sight to that soldier throughout the next alien turn? If this is the case, then a soldier that has been seen by any alien needs to remain in cover because they can potentially be fired out from any location on the map, particularly areas that have not been revealed yet because you don't know what is lurking there.

So this isn't a complaint about squad sight being OP for aliens this time. Well, actually it probably is. We'll see. First thing: I'm in the desert. There's a Harriden that sees my soldier. I walk that soldier around the other side of one of the large rock formations (the big mesa looking things). So he is completely out of line of sight that Harriden. I end my turn, and during the alien turn, a barrage of fire comes out of the fog and toasts my soldier. But he definitely was outta sight of that first Harriden. So I'm not sure what happened there. I didn't think that squad sight worked that way: Do I remain visible to any alien because some alien saw me in the previous turn? If that's the case, then someone ought to cut that business out right now. What I don't know is who the alien was that shot me out of the fog (because I finished the map by holding the alien ship, like a boss). If it was another Harriden, I don't know but I think they have much farther range so maybe that's why it could see me but all I could see was fog? Second thing, and this felt much more like a bug to me: So I've got a soldier crouched behind a flower pot (you know the ones). This is just outside the chopper (on a terror mission map). He's not looking directly ahead, he's angled to the left. I send another soldier round from the back of the chopper to take cover beside him, but as she comes round the chopper she stops, because it turns out a Reaper is next to that first soldier, only one tile away. Scared the hell out of me! Where did that Reaper come from, and how did it sneak up on my soldier like that? This is right at the bottom corner of the map, so it didn't sneak up from behind, it had to cross the road to approach my soldier. And my soldier wasn't facing hard left, he was only angled left a little, so unless it turns out these guys have shocking peripheral vision, I don't understand how that damn beast crept up on me like that, and why it was only revealed when my lady soldier came around the chopper. By the way, and I don't know if I got this impression because all my rocket launcher soldiers happen to be ladies, but the stun rockets are a little bit saucy, don't you think? They're a bit suggestive. I mean, I know this isn't a game for children, but still... Incidentally, is it possible to to take screen shots the regular way or not? I googled and found an old forum post where Chris said it wasn't possible and then Gauddlike called him a filthy liar (his words) so now I don't know what to think.

Well, a personal reply from the Beloved Leader is certainly one way my to placate my fury. I think I'll frame it and keep it above my collection of Leader Beans. Couldn't we nerf squad sight though? (That's right, it's "we" already...). I think there's already an increasing penalty for distance, but maybe that could be increased. Anything to stop my guys getting butchered as soon as they step out of the chopper. That's my real complaint, I guess, is that if the chopper is surrounded it's just a bloodbath, which feels so unfair in that situation because there's no way to prepare for it (it seems to me). It's not like once I'm out in the map and then it's sort of my fault for not taking enough care. Also, I don't want to tell you how to do your job Chris, but the correct response to my whining was actually "shh no tears only dreams now."

I'm not even kidding! Ooh, I'm so mad. Complaint, the first: Squad sight is so broken! Especially when my soldiers are the one's getting killed from it. (When it works to my advantage I don't mind as much). What really rustles my jimmies is when the drop ship is already surrounded by aliens, it's a slaughter house. There's just no way for me to know whether I can move my soldiers out safely or not. Moving them to any piece of cover is worthless because no piece of cover protects you from all directions. It's just too brutal, and it doesn't feel like good game design: It just feels like blind luck, and I have no way to protect against it. Frankly I'd be happier just losing squad sight altogether. If I can shoot it, it should be able to shoot me, I don't see how anything else makes sense. Or, at the very least it should be restricted to snipers and precision weapons. I'm so mad. Complaint, the second: I told one of my jet fighters to disengage, and it did, by flying directly back into the weapon cone of the Corvette. Dammit, I needed that jet! Also, air combat is too brutal. My first play through, it wasn't so bad. I got about half way through November and never saw anything too savage, just the little squadron of three fighters that took me by surprise. But this play through (and I'm still only in November), man, I am getting owned in the skies. Fighter squadrons and Corvettes all over the place. I have to hide in my bases like a little girl until they go away. I'm so mad, I can't even remember what the other things are I wanted to complain about. I wish I didn't love this game so much and then I could just stop playing and I'd be happy again.

Well, I don't know, I seem to regularly get shot by aliens out of areas that haven't been revealed yet so I have no opportunity to shoot back or even to have known that my soldiers were in enemy line of sight. Though I'm not particularly complaining about this, I'm not necessarily saying that it should be symmetrical. When I think back to the incident, the farther away soldiers weren't THAT far away, so it "felt" like they ought to have still been able to fire (and I'm pretty sure the area was lit by a flare), but of course this is just a matter of my limited perspective so I don't know what fiddling with these mechanics would result in. I'm not even that upset about it any more to be honest; I'm much more upset about all my fighter jets that just got shot down, but I only have myself to blame for that... Although after having read this : I realise that actually the real problem was that the soldier I ran over to where I thought the alien had moved away from didn't have his movement interrupted. Usually a soldier stops as soon as an alien becomes visible, which would have let me save my guy in this instance, but he just casually rocked right on over. But apparently you're aware of this, too. Cheers!

Hello! Thanks for the replies. I am playing the stable build, so it sounds like much of what I complained about is being addressed. So, good show! I had a bit more of a think about this fog of war business as I've kept playing. I have noticed for example that an alien's visibility or lack thereof can sometimes be the difference between a soldier being crouched or not. Which I suppose is fair enough. However, the specific incident that I complained was a little bit different. The area in which the alien had been visible didn't go back to black, so it was indeed fow as you say. BUT! I had multiple soldiers who had line of sight to the alien. One was very close, and the others were farther away, but they had all been able to target and shoot at the offending alien. When I moved the closest soldier back behind a wall, that's when the alien could no longer be seen, disappeared inside the fog of war. But it felt to me that those other soldiers should still be able to see the alien, seeing as they had been able to shoot at it the previous turn. I should point at that this was a night mission. So I'm guessing that this severely increases fog of war. But nonetheless, it felt wrong to me that the difference between this alien remaining visible to the soldiers that were farther away was whether the closer soldier had line of sight to that alien. From paying closer attention to this stuff as I've kept playing, I do realise that this is kind of the way these mechanics work, as in this is seems like a deliberate choice from the developers. I don't mind soldiers having to be quite close to an area to make it visible/reveal aliens in the first place. But it seems weird to me that a soldier which has been able to shoot at an alien one turn would simply lose sight of alien because a different, closer soldier no longer has line of sight to that alien. I hope that make sense, I think a lot of those sentences are grammatically awkward, but I hope you get the idea. Nice one gents, thanks again for your time.

Hi, I'm not sure if this is the right place to start complaining about this, but I'm just going to go ahead and do it anyway. First let me say that I've clocked up 17 hours playing the game over the last week and for the most part I'm really, really loving it. But to be honest I'm starting to feel like the cover system is as bad as Enemy Unknown. I regularly have aliens shooting at me through solid walls where they can't possibly have line of sight. That's not cool. Often, my troops are getting shot at but apparently I have no line of sight to my attacker, and that's not cool either. Super frustrating! Also, why can't I lob grenades over things! The number of times I've tried to lob a grenade and it just lands at my feet again. It makes me so mad! And another thing: Sometimes aliens seem to just disappear from view. I just played a mission where the tile that an alien had been in was fully illuminated, it's not like it had gone black again because I had no line of sight. It was visible, and it was empty. So I figured the alien had moved away. Nope. I walked my guy over there and suddenly the alien is just back again. I was so upset about it I decided to register on this forum and make this post. And I am naturally a very, very lazy person, so you can appreciate just how upset I must be right now. Oh, and if I shoot an alien in the face at point blank range with a shotgun, it should be dead. If I shoot it twice in the face at point blank range with the same shotgun it should be especially dead. Seriously, I was no more than two or three tiles away. With shotgun. Twice! I mean, come on! Maybe if I understood the mechanics behind this it would all make a bit more sense. But I guess my point is that it just "feels" wrong when this sort of stuff happens. It feels unfair, and unintuitive, and it takes me out of the game. But for the most part, really great game. And being a huge arsehole, saying nice things does not come easy to me. So, you're welcome.