radek

A bit more of my thoughts RPG elements: Generally it is very fun part of the game. In the Vanilla soldiers were all upgraded up to date usually just after inventing of new weapons has been done. Here things are completely different. High tech weapons weight and cost significantly more, better armors are available only for small group of “chosen ones”. It leads to situations when every single person in your team has a different weapon. Sometimes you just produce weapons just in case cause factories are slow and usually overloaded by work. But even low grade items can still be used to kill an alien (especially Ceasens). Then you have a moral dilemma how to build a team with those soldiers and these weapons. In general it is very well designed bravo XNT team! But I would like to highlight one simple thing. If somehow one of your soldiers survive until mid-game he will automatically become a killing machine around 10x times better than any newcomer. Just look at the picture below. Technically I can give her a laser or even a plasma rifle but I won’t give away such a rare weapon to someone who will die in a sec and won’t be able to hit at anything anyway. I can’t even give her better armor cause she is to weak. So after all I have a half useless soldier. Thanks god you still can kill Ceasans and Vipers with m16 or Zephyr during mid-game but better forget about Sebs or Androns. Giving to new comers better weapons is like throwing money into dump. Literally. On the contrary the “Steel Knight” is not only super-fast and accurate but also extremely durable and panic resistant which prevents him from death. Even furious high concentrated attacks will take maximally half of is hp. Even suppressed he will still be able to escape. He will never as first. And also he will never die as last cause losing entire squad at mission is equal to game over and nobody can afford it. It seems like game is trying somehow to make new soldiers better. In mid game private can kill a zombie with m16. I remember at the begging (in early game) it took 3 or 4 soldiers with m16s to kill one zombie. But problem is not about killing zombies. Problem is fighting with enemy elite soldiers. And this is the problem. I think experienced soldiers are too powerful when new comers are too weak. Also it would be nice to have a up limit for experience and after reaching the highest rank not being able to continue stacking points. Game should not encourage players to make an endless grind. Also making elite soldiers less powerful would have make losses or retreats more a fordable option. General Stuff Weeks 22 -24 is when I invented and applied plasma and my fighters became overpowered. Immediately after it I could cover entire sky (Basic Planes + sporadically Saracans). So good game aliens you can go home . I decided to not send any forces anywhere I have to say that losses increases with the pace of the game . I’m still for making aircraft recoverable in 75% for example cause their losses seems to be stable (and their would be lower if I didn’t misunderstood what auto resolve 100% means – I though it means victory without losses not just victory. Btw I think it should be remade cause it is confusing). I think aliens should be able to perform alien base building, human base attack or even take control over territory missions even without having ufo in the sky to prevent boring periods in the game when enemy danger is reduced to zero only because of having better aircraft. Game tension should be maintained even by allowing enemy to cheat a little bit. Also – mother fuking grinding. Please make some smaller ufos completely destroyed after being shot down. I think it makes people sick when they have to do “yet one another” small scout when knowing that by airstraking it they will lose all those dollars, aleniums, alloys and data cores hiden in it. Ufo disassembling – the idea itself is good but I don’t like how it looks like it the game. I doesn’t rly fit. Since u can’t do anything more with all those data cores than dissemble them it is reduced to just another cash stock pile from a crash site. Also it brings a lot of clicking, you have to send data cores to the production base then produce it (requires free hangar slot so u can’t produce them all and have to do it one by one), then sell it. Before it all can happened u have to research it and it also a few more entries to workshop and making it even less readable. Stun grenades – just op as hell. Alien alloys production – converting cash into alloys, slow but I think it strips down resources management from half of its depth. Instead of collecting and buying weapons accordingly to your possibilities u just convert one resource into another. I’m not completely against it but it seems to me like a redundant simplification. I have heard that next X:CE is comming soon and also XNT 5.3 so i unfortunately wont finish my game i will wait for the next uber version:D

Briefly this time. I will write one more post later about 5.22 about two more diffrent aspects. Tanks: Bit more about them. My suggestions: Hunter Scout Tank TU: 50 --> 60 (its Scout Car it has to be fast) Rate of fire: 3 bursts/turn --> 2 bursts /turn Damage: no change Armor: 100% -> 120% Suppresion: 100% -> 150% (to equalize with rate of fire nerf) Cost: 66k -> 80k Aim: remove close range bonus, add a bit long range bonus (curve should be more linear) Commentary: Scout Car is an early game tank meant to be an equivalent of two Tier-1, lvl-2 soldiers with Jackal Armor and his purpose is to tank damage and provide significant suppression. Scouts Car used to be to slow and even crippled soldiers were running faster. Lowering rate of fire is meant to highlight support fire purpose of this unit and make him less useful in solo raids. Scimitar Tank: Hp: 100 -> 120 Tu: 75 -> 70 (to make hide and seek tactics less profitable) Fire Rate: 3snap/1aim per turn -> 2snap/1aim per turn Damage: Same Armor: 100% -> 130% Suppression: 100% -> 110% (this tank is about destroying cover and providing small suppression) Cost 132k 3al 30aa -> 140k 3al 20aa Aim: Remove close range bonus. If possible make him a bit more able to shoot over obstacles (at least those which are next to him i guess it is impossible) Commentary: Scimitar is an equivalent (approximately) of two Tier-2/3, lvl-3 soldiers with the Coyot armor. Purpose of Scimitar tank is to tank damage, provide some suppression, and destroy cover. As a mid-game tank it has to be faster than Scout Car to keep up with soldier progress but still not as fast to make hide and run tactics less profitable. Lowering rate of fire decrease his damage per turn and highlights his purpose of being a support fire platform instead of a solo killer. It also opens opportunities to make him durability by increasing hp and armor (ammunition last for longer) and open some space for making him more tough. In general: Purpose of a tank is to be an equivalent of two medium quality soldiers (based on the moment of the tank invention so for example the Scout Car is a equivalent of two lvl-2 soldiers with a basic ballistics and the Jacal armor). By giving away learning capability they should be a bit more powerful at start. Tank purpose is to be a support unit for your soldiers. It should combine small damage output with nice utility and durability (suppression, cover destruction, durability, morale and suppression resistance). Tank overall damage output should not be bigger than equivalency of one soldier. Tanks should have lower vision range to prevent player from sending them solo. Tank shouldn’t be affected (as much as soldiers) by high accuracy modifiers (long range decrease in aim and close range high increase in aim) to prevent players from constant maneuvering (people are mobile tanks are, at tactical level, not). And prevent tank from being used as a chainsaw. AI should prioritize hitting tanks (to help them do their job) a bit but lower than it does now. Tell me what do u think about it. Ground Combat: Half of the team is suppressed and on fire – could be worse. Just about Crusier missions (but this is a general issue): I think they are too difficult and here is my explanation why. I did a few of them and most and here is a typical schema: - Killing all aliens hiding in the city without game loading – losses 1 man 1 tank - Attempting to reach ufo entrance – save game - Taking position around ufo’s main door - Sebbilians perform a heroic charge – whole team dead – load game - Taking positions around ufo’s main door - Sebilian’s epic counter attack - half of team is dead, technically I can continue but I will regret it cause there is a - commander inside which is probably even stronger – load game - Taking positions around ufo’s main door - Sebbilians decide to surrender, nope joke, Sebilian’s counter attack – whole team dead – load game And so on. Same story is about reaching last room where commander or officer is hiding. Where for example you can be charged by a commander and his 2 bodyguards all of them with bazookas. And trust me they don’t care about distance and are basically unkillable even at normal difficulty. What I’m heading to is that ground missions seems to be not balanced. It’s good that aliens can perform different moves I have nothing against AI but sometimes they are just too good. Missions are most of the time easy or medium with few super difficult moments. Your soldiers, no matter how good you or they are, cannot fight with more than 2-3 elite aliens at once otherwise they will be wiped out. You have to isolate them and destroy one by one in order to win. And it is ok. But when enemy is charging at you, its usually already too late to do anything. Even when you know charge will take place it’s still hard to make any preparations cause actually you have to get close to the door anyway to get into it. Putting some Extra Difficult Moments like counter attack or commander boss fight at the end of the Crusier mission (counter attack of 3 elite aliens with bazookas - good luck) only encourages players to save-load game zillion of times not really to save their soldiers but to save precious time spent on playing a major of the mission.

Yay! Finally something about game performance.

Hahaha i just went in and saw this. Poland ball is everywhere over the internet even here.

Ye deffinetly i was thinking about the same. How to force player to do night missions

First of all thanks to all the XNT team for creating great mod which fulfils all my needs and wishes! Great job. Also congrats to Selgrad for victory of his team over France in football championships (did France rise a white flag after 20 minutes or play until the end? JOKE!). Great job. Technical Stuff: XNT V5.22 Skitso MapPack 2000 Bloodmod Roles icons from Skitso’s Oppressive UI Difficulty: Normal (although I basically almost never do reload game) === Early game review (first 3 months) === Air Combat: Since war against aliens occur during cold war my air strategy was rather also cold war like (slightly like in the red army cause my mind couldn’t invent anything more sophisticated than a frontal attack ) But then came Josh Eales with his Anti-Scout “Cobra Maneuver”. And it was brilliant (not to mention he invented it before Scouts have even been seen by the human kind – what a smart guy!). Never have time to read the Xenopedia cause you are too busy killing aliens? Better check this out! I said ok if this guy invented this it must work. And it did work. I have to say that Air Combat is now waaaay better that it used to be. Planes have more fuel and rockets. Can perform dodge and shoot more often. Air skirmishes last longer and are more interesting. Especially 3 v 3 fights. Big bravissimos for that. Too bad aliens do not have their “Josh Eales” and every time they just pick one target which then furiously chase. If they could from time to time change target at least or try to escape or whatever that would be great. BTW: I hope Josh Eales will also invent some “Apollo Maneuvers” cause I’m still a noob pilot and can’t figure it out. I just have no hangar space for such a weak planes Infantry Weaponry: First of all, basic Shotguns SUCK BALLS. Not only it has no range but also no damage. Sucks completely. When zombie come close to you just shot couple of rifle’s bursts and he is done. Advanced ballistics are nice. They weight twice as much but I guess it is because alenium is heavy or something. Anyway its cool. Zephyr is my favorite but advanced MG is not bad as well. But there is a mess with weapons. You have 4 types of pistols. Basic, which is obviously the worst one, then is smg, then some kind of strong revolver and same revolver but doubled (one per hand). In the last case obviously u can’t hold shield. So we have 3 types of assault units. Shotgun which sucks, better shotgun which also sucks and 2 revolvers that can literally melt any alien early game units. And I don’t want to listen any of “But pirate advanced shotguns can pierce armor and…” – I don’t care. No one can stand double revolver no matter if he has armor or not. What next? For example pistols than can shot almost as fast as rifle on burst mode. Or revolver which 3 level aim just to compare sniper rifle has 2. As to sniper rifles. There are quite low. Hard to say what is wrong with them. Maybe adding +5 range would make them better and more “sniper”. I don’t know. I use them no matter what but it is definitely one of the “forgotten weapons” like shotguns. Sometimes aliens can be really smart. Do you see that mess around Ufo’s entrance? The last fucking alien is playing hide and seek game over there. Fucking blue robot with a grenade launcher. After two attempts we are already out of soldier. Of course he won’t leave his position which makes continuing of this mission pointless. Time to retreat. What next? Machine guns In my opinion have lost their purpose. It is so hard to suppress anybody. Valiant Sebillan will rather die than humiliate himself and whole his family by showing that he gives a damn about bullets and rockets flying all around. And also such a big weapon isn’t very handy right? But here it is extremely dangerous in close combat. It’s hard to imagine soldier holding such a weapon to be able to kill very agile and quick Viper. But here he can. Maybe this is a chainsaw or something. I think MG.’ should have lowered close accuracy bonus. Also there is no consistency with Vanilla. Sometimes our scientist can invent 4 different laser weapons at once when some other time they are tinkering with every single pistol separately. If I could chose I would like to have Vanilla “one big project” policy everywhere. So let’s say 2 techs – “Advanced Ballistics” and “Advanced Rocket Launcher”. Manufacturing and general game flow: Manufacturing is well balanced. Now u have to choose wisely what to buy. Unfortunately money is problem so air striking is none an option anymore. Grind, grind, grind bro. But after all its better. You don’t only high end equipped soldiers and so much money that you can 10 million dollars on charity. Nothing really to say about manufacturing – just good job guys! Very good. Here is a losses table. As u can see in early game aircraft are relatively safe. Aircraft loses seems to be linear and relatively low. 30 ground battles in total (2 lost) 1 terror (lost) 1 attack at alien base (won) 0.7 soldier’s lost per mission Aircraft loses are very low and stable with periodically occurring events (like Tu-10 run out of fuel and was shot down by a small scout etc.). Air combat outcome is very predictable. Ufos behave more or less in a predictable way. Their potential is known and our potential is known so I guess in a good hands air losses can be lowered and hold at level zero. Which brings me to an idea that maybe it would be better to make aircraft unrecoverable? Like tanks and troopers. Or at least recoverable in let’s say 50%. What do you think about it? But what would be definitely the best option is add some randomization to air combat. Ground Combat: Small Scouts and Scouts presents none threat at all. Corvettes and Alien Bases presents medium threat and can be easily performed with acceptable losses. Terror mission happened once and presented overwhelming alien charge. Soldier losses tend to increase linearly mostly due to fact of lineal increase of battle frequency not because of increase in enemy soldiers quality. Losses are acceptable and new soldier relatively fast can replace lost ones. Elite squad can be formed no lack of equipment or well-trained soldiers. After introduction of Corvette Ufo Type Tanks are becoming more and more obsolete – which I basically don’t like. Tank losses rises rapidly and tanks can be used only as a support unit for less dangerous missions. It is barely seen at the chart but I would have lose 2 or 3 more if I haven’t been lucky. Tank becoming obsolete so fast is a big hole in my opinion. But lets assume it is somehow explained by storyline. Alien Technology Capturing or rather “Alien’s Thanksgiving Day” One of the biggest Alien mistake in early phase of the war was allowing human forces to localize and capture their base at the November, 21 1979. Alien base is equal in difficulty level to Corvette but from enemy base you can recover not only huge amount of viable resources like alenium, alien alloys or medals for your soldiers but also a very important technology which will increase effectiveness of your laboratories and workshops by 50% practically for free. So as we can see aliens giving away important base technologies is a pretty common thing here but when it comes to capturing alien’s officer oh god it’s a different story. He is like a freaking PAC-MAN! But instead of eating yellow dots he eats STUN GRENADES. If you want take him alive bring 15 or 20 stun grenades (im not joking now) , 1 or 2 shotguns (they do no dmg but stun a little) and a machinegun to suppress that mother fucker. I don’t even want to think how tough Sebillan Commander can be. A.I. Looks like it’s getting better all the time. Vipers attack in swarms. Zombies are walking around like zombies should walk. Regular soldiers can throw a grenade in the less predictable moment. I even had a situation when Sebillan’s officer retreated two times towards his ufo in a row when rest of the Sebbillians were covering his retreat. Nice. It would be nice to have also some kind of unpredictability. Like for example in 1 per 10 crash sites all aliens are outside the ufo. Or charging at u. But what they do doesn’t matter, just to have this nice surprise gift “oh its finished already – I don’t need to attack ufo this time” . Tanks: I love to use tanks. They provided everything I need. They do tank (being focused by enemy) are relatively tough, provide suppress and can be send as first. That’s theory. Anyway tanks got nerfed hard. They are slower and less accurate at short distances. But they still kick ass and finally behave more like tanks. Very good. They have low upkeep so you can have some of them in reserves. Or in case of a base attack. My suggestions: Make their accuracy more linear. Lower a bit short distance accuracy bonus and increase at long range a bit. Armor values should be rebalanced for a bit (if possible) against rifles and pistols. It looks stupid when an officer with bazooka does 20 dmg to tank and a regular trooper with one busrt can do 9 + 21 + 22 = 52 dmg so twice us much. It also looks funny when a dude with Jacal armor is sometimes harder to kill than your Scout Car. Rear armor is made of paper now (to big difference between rear and front armor). Basically dmg against tanks should be more predictable. Let’s say that pistols now do 5 dmg bazooka 20 rifle 30. It should go towards something like 7 20 17 u know what I mean? Variation has to be lowered both minimum and maxim amount of dmg taken. To recompense Hunter could be for example more expensive to produce (but not to upkeep) Another problem with tanks is that they are getting obsolete really fast. And there is no replacement. (In mid game there will be another tank but im not there yet) Of course absolutely super would be making them able to be upgraded. Like for example some kind of buyable extra plating or being able to attach better hmg’s (laser scatter) but it is I guess its technically impossible.

Please make empty (used) medic kits disappear. It is supper annoying.

But this game is not about reality - it is about men in power armors with plasma guns.

Dont get us wrong u can do it or play it if u want to. We are just saying our opinion. No offense ;] U know i played TFTD couple od times (but not the original it was some kind of community bug fixed version or whatever with translation cause back then i didnt know english) and rly whenever ship terror came i was like: "oh god why me? i have only few hours for playing and this is happening? god why me?" ;D Since then i dont like 2-stage misiions.

Totally agree. Big "No WaY" for 2-stage missions.

Hmm, ok I can try. I will pm you.

But professional team can for example unify everything and change source code drastically. Or add some extra graphic effects. And also official made add-on looks more professional. Mods always looks like someone's fantasy when DLC is official, coherent, full, certified, well-tested. You know what i mean.

I think current game mechanics prevent crash sites and terrors from disappearing when there is at least one dropship assigned to them.

Hmmm I like your idea very much. Very nice and well explained too. Just a small suggestion what do you think about making new weapons more expensive for lets say 1 month. I have no time right now to think about possible game mechanics consequences but its in my opinion easier to explain in Xenopedia why new weapons are more expensive in production (cause they are only prototypes and we dont have assembly lane yet blah blah). How u will explan to players why old weapons become cheaper "Just After" researching Laser Weaponary for example, in terms of game coherency? From mechanic point of view I rly like your idea but how to put it into game without this strange feeling "hey this is weird? What the hell game devs did that?"

Dont worry someone sooner or later will do it. I was even thinking about making maps. But the map editor looks so complicated for me thta I think I would have need extra one week time or so only to learn how to operate it.

Hahah, but in the game. He will get extra recomplied version with ONE extra scout car - YEAH!

And again Desura is light years behind...

Nice man!

Its cool cause u have to pay for clips. Its adds some depth. But additional clicks u have to perform to sort all things out. Hmm. But idea itself is very intresting i will test it.

How many weapons do u have got in this compilation in total?

Hey I have an idea. Cause as far as i know we can do now modify ammo type right? What about making all ammos TU's draining? Just slightly. I think it would be useful to strengthen a little bit reaction fire. Cause now alien can get next to ur entire squad shot everything and maybe he will lose half hp but still it looks like nothing happened. Also the same effect would have an impact on soldiers. It is some kind of a shock after hit. And it only would matter for TU's in this turn (so as I said before small enchantment for reaction fire). XNT guys and the rest of the people what do you think about it?

It was probably mentioned somewhere but what do you think about making one variation of any map. Changes doesn't necessary has to be big just swap some things, move them around. What do you think is that easy for you (or difficult/boring/pointless)? Cause at least theoretically it would give us twice as much maps and im really wondering about that.

I just mean that, in my opinion, it makes just a slightly difference in the game. Each ground mission normally cost you something which means that from time to time u will have to send weaker forces due to lack of supplies right? Cause u can lose weapons, can lose armors, can lose soldiers right? Difference is only in the fact that you you separate "amor lose event" with "soldier lose event". But it wont change our late game balance problem which was this topic about. @kabil I know it is very difficult I understand. My suggestion is just to focus on those mechanisms and concepts that are not invasive. Even if they are just a small improvements. But u know in general u guys have great ideas. I just not convinced to all of them. ;]

Excelent job. Looks nice and very sexy.

This mechanism already exist. When soldier dies his armor is lost.