Surrealistik

Don't forget to add grenade rolling/underhand throw modes as an option; that everyone has to throw a massive arcing overhand is ridiculous, and makes no sense, particularly in alien bases and other low ceiling environments.

Why do you imagine that retrofitting is such an insurmountable obstacle? It's a strawman to assert that they have to build new weapons from scratch to feature biolocking and self-destruct mechanisms. Further, you're also assuming that these systems wouldn't already be standard issue, especially for an armada that is seeking out worthy sentient life to take traits from and incorporate into its empire; such an assumption by itself doesn't make a great deal of sense to start. Further, I'm not ignoring reliability and cost considerations so much as I'm making the argument that they'd be highly unlikely per alien tech levels relative to the specific tech being discussed; biolocking and automated scuttling mechanisms. Of course reliability and cost are enduring concerns, but that's besides the point in this specific case where it can be reasonably expected that those particular pieces of technology would meet such criteria, particularly when we're not far from being able to implement similar tech which does. If you don't think that it adds anything to the game, that's cool, to each their own, and there's a subjective element to be sure. In my view it adds some sorely needed verisimilitude, tactical depth and tradeoffs/interesting choices (though I will grant that stunning at the moment is probably too easy via Electroshock nades).

Not sure why any of them would have their armour on unless its crucial to their survival per the Harridan, or literally integrated with their bodies and even then it might make more sense just to hook it up as necessary to life support and apply restraints. Other than that, these look awesome, especially the Reaper, damn.

Is the last mission supposed to loop infinitely after destroying the generators, hordes of Reapers, the high praetor (HP) and escaping to the pod room beyond the HP with everyone alive? If the best ending isn't finished, why not just have a splash screen congratulating the player on obtaining it, or did you not expect anyone to actually manage that? Also, is the last mission not yet complete? TBH it was effortless next to tackling a late game terror site or raiding a large base, or even a battleship. Negative nancy stuff out of the way though, this was a great game and a lot of fun in spite of the flaws.

Predator armour should make the Andron clomping noises when moving, or something like them; something ominous and intimidating. Agree about the need for radio chatter, not so sure about 'wise cracks'.

Why not just rock the riskless doorman strat and collect more loot though?

So, what I said.

That's fucking awesome; hope the devs add them to the game.

If RF is what's killing you, that is the solution. But yeah, that said, if you've blown that much on bases, you might be pretty far behind. I wouldn't go for more than 3 or 4 until the late game.

Why do you have to blow up a door? This is assuming a typical unlocked door; this standard operating procedure works perfectly for such doors, including the one in the screenshot. Combat shields of course work for spotting and soaking RF when you have to; just substitute the door shenanigans from my SOP with a combat shield spotter of choice; retreat him back into smoke after the aliens have been spotted and proceed to open fire.

How do you lose guys? Here is an EZ step by step method for clearing any room in an alien base with no casualties: Have one guy adjacent to the door. He is the door man. Have the door man open the door to spot. Have the door man close the door. Have someone throw down a smoke grenade just before the door. Have the door man open the door. Hose down the Androns (or whatever else), especially with autofire/shottie spam, and/or spam electronades or better. Win.

Wait, what? First, the self-destruct mechanisms would only ever be armed during periods of engagement. If a weapon self-destructs during an engagement after its user dies for whatever reason, that's exactly by design, working as intended. As for locker stashed weapons, they wouldn't be imprinted, but it's trivial for a weapons locker (usually in a heavily fortified area to begin with) to send self-destruct signals to its contents in the event of an unauthorized breach/handling/proximity depending on how paranoid the aliens are. I'm not sure what self-destruct mechanisms on the weapon have to do with mishandling having devastating consequences (again, it isn't a bottle of nitro strapped to the weapon), especially since that mishandling is unlikely to occur in the first place being as the non-combatant aliens are essentially puppets of leader consciousnesses.

The way you kill Androns is the same way you kill everything else in V19: blind fire/nade spam (using electropulse or better) through smoke. In V20 use the old blind fire tactics with explosives. For precision weapons, just scout with the upgraded tactical shield, soak the RF if necessary, then throw down with a shit ton of fire power.

Dread: I'm almost certain this has been brought up before, but dread that affects pretty much everyone all the time makes me 'dread' doing base assaults for all the wrong reasons, especially with all those tedious pop ups you can't click through. The range of it should either be _much_ smaller, or it should only affect those with LoS to the Praetor. Both me and the Xenonauts streamer I follow cannot stand it. It is impossible to describe in words how utterly annoying this is. Battle Rifles: Deals so much damage and has so much penetration it makes all armour but the Predator (and arguably the Sentinel due only to its flight capabilities) essentially pointless; it is a quantum leap up from the standard plasma weaponry, handily outperforming even the plasma sniper rifle on a per shot basis. Even Predator clad units with high Resilience can get one shot by this weapon while getting two shot is about guaranteed. The balance should be similar to Plasma Rifles vs Wolf Armour when it comes to Predator Armour, and Plasma Rifles vs Jackal Armour when it comes to everything else that's Wolf tier or better. As is, this weapon is ridiculous, especially since it's such a huge and abrupt increase in lethality.

@ Gorlom: Why would they be biolocked to an individual alien so they're not interchangeable? That argument doesn't make sense; assuming biolocking were to be in place, all aliens would be authorized operators, with authorization likely being verified via implants. Further, the self-destruct mechanism could easily be imprinted to the last authorized operator; when it dies, the mechanism kicks in. @ Sapare: Agreed, there shouldn't be much of a war at all if the aliens are smart, but it's about achieving the balance between realism/versimilitude and gameplay, so yes, while the aliens could be smart in some ways (self-destruct mechanisms), they have to be stupid in others (the entire logistics/execution of the war) for there to be a game at all. The idiocy of the latter doesn't mean that they should never exhibit intelligence. While I agree that self-destructing weapons would require a limited revision of how tech progression is handled, I believe it's worth it. Lastly, I also agree that X-Com's handling of self-destructing weapons was questionable in some ways (some meaningful technology could be reverse engineered from their fragments). To its credit though, you could not reverse engineer plasma technology from the alien weapon fragments, so in that regard, the scuttling technology was absolutely successful. Either way, the flaws of X-Com's specific implementation of the element does not mean that other, better implementations should be overlooked/dismissed. @Gauddlike: #1: Yes, military deployment of biolocking/smart gun technologies would require almost total reliability and would require them to be low cost for mass deployment outside of specialized peacekeeping and policing roles, agreed, was not disputing this. It's a pending technology, not a currently adopted one. #2: For the aliens not to be aware of the technological value and superiority of their weapons vis a vis humanity would require unfathomable stupidity in contrast to their leadership's obvious intelligence (its obligatory stupidity that allows Xenonauts to be a playable game aside). As before, I sincerely doubt whether either reliability or cost of self-destruct mechanisms are at all concerns for the aliens in light of their vastly superior technology and scientific understanding.

A streamer I follow (link provided for those interested in watching the playthrough) currently running Xenonauts v19 managed to abort a mission despite a Reaper and zombie being aboard the Charlie, thus saving his remaining two men. While I'm certainly happy for him, especially as my character managed to come out of it alive, surely these craft don't come equipped with magical alien repulsion systems which would allow for this? That said, mission abortions should obviously be prevented if aliens are on the dropship/in the evac zone.

Sources contained within the article. Also this is a forum argument, not an academic treatise. Smart guns technology is in the process of military implementation. As stated in the wiki article, per the Weapons Act, Germany plans to make it a legislated requirement for _all_ small arms produced by the country without any military specific exception when such technology meets viability/performance thresholds, _including_ retrofitting of existing German weapons; this alone implies a significant and international pending military adoption of the technology (given the prolific and international scope of German manufactured weaponry). Law enforcement adoption, which you admitted as being both viable and existent, also features military units that engage in peacekeeping and law enforcement capacities. Again, I never claimed that literal self-destruct mechanisms are or were ever used by any military per their small arms. Firelocking technology is absolutely being developed for military use however, and is pending implementation. Show me where I said/claimed that self-destructing small arms have a real-life military precedent; please. I challenge you to pull even a single quote actually stating this. The closest I've ever come in asserting it (despite ultimately not doing so) is by pointing out that the current state of smart gun technology suggests that biometric locking mechanisms and by extension, death triggered self-destruct mechanisms, are not particularly outlandish and would be easily realized by aliens with vastly superior tech more than a century ahead of our own. And yes, my argument is, and has always been with respect to small arms self-destruct mechanisms, that they would be used by the aliens to prevent reverse engineering on the basis that the technology of their small arms is worth insulating against reverse engineering (completely unlike our small arms), and that they'd have the technology to create such mechanisms with acceptable durability, reliability and performance. Again, as repeatedly stated, I brought up the Hainan Island incident to highlight that militaries adopt and practise policies of technological denial where warranted, so the aliens would probably act likewise, including with respect to their small arms which indeed have technologies worth protecting. Hopefully this latest repetition will be enough to allow that fact to become apparent to you.

Smoke spam and point blank autofire to the face. Stun sticks also work.

Frag grenade splash is ridiculously underpowered, and grenades seem to have no real niche save as reliable finishers against badly injured stun immune aliens. Increase the 'scatter' potential for a frag (i.e. the range of squares that it can ultimately end up in), but upgrade the splash damage. I also generally agree with the comments/criticisms about ridiculously low accuracy and absurdly high durability.

You may not find wikipedia to be a valid reference but the linked sources absolutely are. That said, the point of detailing smart gun technologies, as repeatedly stated earlier in the thread, is that we, mere humans, have such technology already at our disposal which is planned for deployment to military and law enforcement agencies. Further, if we, mere humans, can develop and deploy such technology, the aliens can surely do better, including their own smart weapon technology that is cheaper and significantly more reliable to the point of being basically foolproof which could both deny unauthorized usage, and self-destruct on operator death. Surely we would not add self-destructing mechanisms to our weaponry, but the aliens likely would since: A: Their small arms are orders of magnitude more advanced than our most sophisticated weapon systems, and thus we have a great deal to gain from reverse engineering them, thus such mechanisms are invaluable in minimizing human resistance which is clearly an objective of the aliens. B: Virtually all of the alien species are considered disposable even in the extremely remote chance there were any kind of malfunction of the self-destruct mechanism which would furthermore be exceedingly unlikely per their technology. The point of bringing up the Hainan Island incident is to prove that our militaries routinely feature doctrines of scuttling and denial of technological capture, to those who, for some reason, inexplicably seem to believe that these require ineffable foresight beyond even aliens far more intelligent than we are. That said, because we do routinely implement such policies, it's clearly only reasonable that the aliens would implement similar doctrines with respect to their armed forces, particularly in light of the exponential gulf between our technology and theirs; i.e. it's all the more important to feature them in their case.

Citation provided (as it was earlier in the thread): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personalized_gun BIOMAC specifically mentions developing technology for military purposes with a goal of 99.99% reliability or better, and 0.5 second recognition speed or less. Existing advanced (non-magnetic) designs have ~90% German legislation will require that _all_ guns manufactured within German borders will implement smart gun technology the moment that such technology is viable. No military exemption was provided. It's a fledgling technology to be sure, but it is in demand and it is on its way. No deployment of the technology will not be universal (chiefly due to cost), but it does make all the sense in the world for certain forces, especially occupation and peacekeeping forces that double as impromptu police enforcement. Now fast forward that technology a 100 years or so with designers far more intelligent than we are; yeah, somehow I don't think reliability concerns are an issue. Effectively you have a system that is all benefit, no downside. The aliens aren't law enforcement but they certainly don't want reverse engineering of their plasma technology from small arms that are themselves orders of magnitude more advanced than any of our 1970s-80s weapon systems. Lastly, I cited the Hainan Island incident because it is an example of technology denying protocols in action. The gulf between US and Chinese technology is considerably smaller than the gulf between alien plasma small arms and... pretty much anything humanity has. Go figure that they would implement similar protocols to safeguard that technology then.

One of the very best additions to the game; the default set was limited and boring, and this breathes a lot of new life into Xenonauts. Looking forward to yet more maps in the future.

Pretty cool. Much as I like it now, I'm definitely looking forward to a version that provides for the female soldiers as well. Don't suppose you could also rip the soldier chatter from Halflife 1 & 2?

... No. I consider your position ridiculously stupid because standard military protocol that is _currently implemented_ already provides for the self-destruction of classified technology! Real life example: the Hainan Island incident; here the crew was explicitly instructed in the event of emergency to destroy classified technology and sensitive items to thwart Chinese reverse engineering of data and sophisticated electronics. If our armies _already_ feature such procedures, why on earth would the aliens not adopt similar policies when the potential repercussions posed by reverse engineering is that much greater in their case, and they presumably have the intelligence to realize this? It just doesn't add up; your position doesn't make sense. It's not attributable to personal opinion so much as how modern armed forces function in real life. To preempt you, no, the aliens aren't real life combatants, but they should be expected to demonstrate at least as much sense as our militaries. @ STK: Lol. Show me one (1) grasping argument of mine; just one, please. Best of luck. @ Brochacho: ...so your argument then is that biometric imprinting on weapons for instance, something currently in the process of implementation on a wide scale in many military and law enforcement agencies across the world, doesn't make sense despite their collective opinion, assessment and studies? Smart gun technology is extremely reliable; alien variants of the tech likely more so. Anyways, the argument is futile since the balance will apparently not be changed to accommodate this mechanic.

I'm sorry but this is simply ridiculous. How is it in any way prophetic foresight for an advanced, presumably intelligent alien species to safeguard against reverse engineering? You do realize that modern armies have been and continue to be trained to destroy and scuttle classified technology and weaponry to prevent them from falling into foreign/enemy hands and being reverse engineered right? The problem with this argument (i.e. aliens are already acting incredibly stupid in one respect, so why not another?) is that the illogical progression is basically required for the gameplay, whereas an absence of self-destructing weaponry is not required. Stupidity should only be mandated where it benefits the gameplay. It makes sense in the same way the whole alien invasion makes sense; a necessary lapse in logic for the sake of gameplay. Self-destruction on death works to enhance gameplay IMO while simultaneously improving verisimilitude because it adds a risk/reward tradeoff. A biometric lock that prevents usage even on a successful stun improves verisimilitude but at the indisputable cost of gameplay. Yes, there are complaints about those elements, but in balance, they make for a better game; likewise for self-destructing weaponry IMO. Second, I have seen nothing per the developers that yet suggests alien weapons are meant to be used only on an emergency basis. Even if it were true though, the trouble involved in retrieving and using them with my suggestions clearly highlights that such looted weapons are hardly a first priority. So basically, you think the aim penalty justifies (or at least partly justifies) the unjustifiable (i.e. being forced to sell looted alien weapons?), and removing that penalty somehow removes the solitary thing that prevents players from getting rabid over not being able to keep alien weapons? If so, that's pretty silly as arguments go. #1: The alien weapons aren't always better than the player weapons, even at low tech levels. #2: Stunning your way to a full complement of alien weapons for your squad every mission isn't always viable and is rarely going to be the optimal strategy in practice, especially during large fire fights. The counterbalancing risk is real; losing troops just isn't worth an increment in fire power most of the time. Actually it pretty well is. You shouldn't find yourself in that tenuous situation to start where you have just enough ammo to drop an alien and steal its weapon to finish off the others (assuming weapons didn't self-destruct); the moment you start to flirt with ammo depletion (which is again very unlikely as things stand), you should begin to make contingencies to stun an alien and take his weapons/ammo. Again, foresight is important. I have to admit, giving the increasingly stretching, desperate quality of some of these criticisms, you seem to be less concerned about the quality of the idea and more concerned about being 'right'.