(Mod Update) XNT Into Darkness V5.3 - "The Firebat" (DISCUSSION THREAD)

[ventuswings]

See if you are allowed to shoot multiple times with machine gun. To my knowledge weapon sounds and TU % fire values are controllec by same xml, so it should be able to tell you if weapon part of the mod was installed correctly.

[Victor_Tadeu]

Sup, guys! I came back to Into Darkness after a long time and I'm loving the new stuff so much! The AI behaves better and the game seens more stable.

Already have some feedback to give. Last time I played (long ago) I remember that wounded soldiers recovering time was much longer. A soldier who lost most of his HP, like, more than 70% and still managed to survive, used to take several days to recovery. Something like 10 to 20 days if I remember well. But now the biggest recovering time I saw was something like 6 days...

I used to have a big soldiers list to do all missions I can. My "base team" used to be around 20 soldiers taking turns when one fall wounded and stay away a time, sometimes away something like 3 waves or so. But now, with only around 6 days recovering time, this isn't needed and it feels kinda... weel, to easy. A pro soldier can recover very fast and there is no much point in keeping many reserves. A heavilly wounded soldiers can be fit to fight just in the next wave.

The recovering time really was boosted that much? Maybe is the hospital building that now give a bigger bonus than before? Or it just an illusion of mine, since I just came back to the game now and may be comparing early game wounds with mid game ones?

Plus I already have to freezes and ctds sometimes when a soldier walk through smoke. Mod bug or game bug, someone knows?

[blackwolf]

hi victor, and welcome back from the battle zone, its good to know that you were just M.I.A . About the soldier recovery issue well thats from vainilla but,in my gameplay this varies sometime...in early game almost everyone of my soldier survive all the hits and even when they were listed as kia in the mission, in the resume after the mission almost 75% survive with just 1 or 2 deaths. Now on nov-december the majority of my soldiers are KIA instead of WIA..so i always keep around 20+ soldiers in my base, and send a mixture of veterans and rookies.

about the CTDs is because the X:CE that gives a lot of features and a couple of bugs from time to time (thats the reason i quit of playing in ironman mode ).

[Victor_Tadeu]

hi victor, and welcome back from the battle zone, its good to know that you were just M.I.A . About the soldier recovery issue well thats from vainilla but,in my gameplay this varies sometime...in early game almost everyone of my soldier survive all the hits and even when they were listed as kia in the mission, in the resume after the mission almost 75% survive with just 1 or 2 deaths. Now on nov-december the majority of my soldiers are KIA instead of WIA..so i always keep around 20+ soldiers in my base, and send a mixture of veterans and rookies.

about the CTDs is because the X:CE that gives a lot of features and a couple of bugs from time to time (thats the reason i quit of playing in ironman mode ).

Thanks, guy! I hope I dont become KIA instead MIA until november, too! Hahaha!

Well, I never played Xenonauts in Ironman either because the game was in beta or because I was testing XNT: Into Darkness or because the game is pretty much unstable most of the part anyway. But I still remember when I started to play Xenonauts... when even killing a crouched caesian resulted in a ctd... rough times, hahahaha!

Plus: I noticed something odd in Gargol behaviour. Sometimes when you engange them at very long range, on the limit of your sight line, they dont charge you even if they take damage. They just keep running to one side to the other, taking cover in buildings or such, but never goes into your direction. Looks like they dont know what is shooting them or from where it is coming. If you move just a little closer, they charge you as usual. It's not exactly a bug... I imagine that like if they really dont know from where the bullets are coming, since they are mindless goons!

It made me wonder... do all the aliens have the same sight range? It's the same of xenonauts in day time? Does xenonauts have a bigger sight range than some of them, like the gargols?

[blackwolf]

NO, as far as i know, aliens have a little bit longer vision range(specially harridans)..on night most of them still having the same range but the xenos lost roughly one third(1/3) of their vision because of darkness,and for the last one, yes there are a couple of them with minor variation (all the ranges variation are just a couple of tiles more or less). And about the gargols, you are right they are "erratic and mindless" so they dont follow a normal path of movements(except if they see you were they should charge to you without hesitating). Thats encourage you to take him with heavy fire from long distance, snipers, rpgs and rifle fire does the trick...or you can make a totally different aproach and hit them with shotgun and flamethrowers .

[Victor_Tadeu]

I already faced some Gargols and I am 100% sure that they arent charging mindless all the time. Sometimes they are playing much more like vipers, trying ambushes and avoiding direct exposure and frontal advance, but much more less efficiently than vipers. I even saw two Gargols together avoiding to get out of the UFO, taking shots and grenades, just to avoid the muzzle barrage that was waiting to ambushe them as soon they try to charge. It's kinda hard to lure them out when they dont want to come. One of this gargols, when I charge in, even run away from my troops, totally ignoring them, and travelling to the other side of the map and hiding in a building.

But honestly in face of the new gargols description in Xenopedia (it is new to me), the one about childrens and parts of their minds, I dont imagine Gargol just like mindlees goons anymore. I think about them more like a very stupid scared brute who dont want to get hurt, convinced that xenonauts are somewhat responsible for their suffering and feels forced to fight in self defence. Not a evil minded predator like the viper or a fearless walking tank like the reaper, neither and a simple zombie.

In fact, the guy who created that new description deserves my congratulations 'cause that was some dark heavy stuff! Hahaha!

[ventuswings]

In matter of congratulating Xenopedia writer, I must join in and give props to whomever wrote the descriptions for Vipers as well. I was initially worried because their original description involved something silly like Caesan planet-scape and "Protean alliance" (how do we know all this stuff anyway?) but the actual Xenopedia entry is quite well-written and somewhat believable.

One thing about Gorgol autopsy was that, well, though I never managed to capture one of them alive yet, I must assume there is separate analysis available for 10% damage boost to these guys - so the initial inspection on the species is done purely using the corpses instead of alive specimen. So technically Dorothy cannot exist yet. It's bit of a nit-pick though among otherwise excellent entry, however.

[Victor_Tadeu]

I can understand that Dorothy came from a moribund Gargol, but you said something important... there is any point in capturing some of the new aliens alive?? I never tried to capture one 'cause I suppose there is nothing to get from it.

[Theoderich]

I tried..and failed. Must try again sometime... Especially with Vipers. I in the beginning it was so hard to kill them that capturing was definetly not a concern, and now they die too fast. The problem is: It sees like you need to crack their armour first to be able to effectively stun them. But judging the right moment to switch to stuns is hard, especially since I try to NOT let them get close, so I don't usually have a shocker close enough to do it.

Capturing a Gargole should be easier, a soldier in Wolf armour or beyond is mostly imune to them,so he( or she) got aaaalt the time in the world to bring that baton to bear.

And I would like to hop on the praise wagon for the Xenopedia-entries for the new aliens

[ventuswings]

I believe someone said stunning Viper Delta and Alpha would unlock new researches respectively, but can't seem to find it.

[Silencez]

I captured a gargol and a viper, but to my surprise, there where no additional researches for them.

on both, i used masses of pistol ammo, and then vortex + stun + flash grenades.

when u finish the mission, it says that you captured a viper / gargol en send to research dep.

any comment on additional info / lack of/ for the research captured ones?

[Zelius]

Stunned gargols and small vipers don't give any research, Delta and Omega vipers are the only ones that do.

[Alewalek]

All live aliens that was captured give at least 10% to damage against them, up to this sometime they unlock some techs, for me viper or garghol or both unlocked sulphur rocket luncher.

[Theoderich]

This means I must go out there and capture some big game... ah well. To the hunt then!

[Victor_Tadeu]

Well... so even if I dont get a tech from small vipers and gargol I still get the bonus from capturing they alive? Good enough.

And what about androns and scout disks? Can those things be captured alive too? Since they are droid I dont know if there is any point at it.

[Alewalek]

I said alive aliens not robots.

[Silencez]

All live aliens that was captured give at least 10% to damage against them, up to this sometime they unlock some techs, for me viper or garghol or both unlocked sulphur rocket luncher.

ah yes, correctly, one of those did that. as I captured both at the same time, can't tell :-)

you can stun robots (stun rods), but can't capture them. I guess they are 'kaput' ...

[blackwolf]

you can't stun androns because they are robots, i know, thats sound a pretty silly but this came from vainilla .

[fu12]

I seem to have run into a bug. I decommissioned my Charlie b/c i had just gotten the next dropship. When I did, I suddenly "had no soldiers on base". This did not fix itself even after I hired more soldiers (I didnt have any unassigned).

[ventuswings]

I think that is vanilla or X:CE bug, just have to wait for next version of XNT which will likely incorporate X:CE v1.09 to come out I hope.

[Ozi]

reproducible crash: loading goes into ground combat, aliens turn. Locks up after few seconds of alien movement. Very sad as it is ironman, so my game is dead now.

Aut.sav

Aut.sav

[Victor_Tadeu]

I seem to have run into a bug. I decommissioned my Charlie b/c i had just gotten the next dropship. When I did, I suddenly "had no soldiers on base". This did not fix itself even after I hired more soldiers (I didnt have any unassigned).

I run into similar bug. It seens to happens when you have no soldiers boarded in any ship. Try to wait the production of the new ship and then board a single soldier in the dropship and see if you can edit their equipment again. This works to me.

[ventuswings]

How do you guys deal with that alien weapon having massive blast radius? I've just did my first Landing Ship mission and got destroyed by several Caesans trotting those monstrosity - it was literally sea of flames. Should I wait for the wolf armour to reliably stand a chance?

[fu12]

@ventuswings: I'm fairly certain the soldier/dropship bug isnt a vanilla bug (unless it was in 1.08?).

bugfind #2 (I only recently got off my arse to find mods, so this might have been reported already): Coyote Armor only renders in the Equip screen for female troopers. Male coyote armor is blank (you get a floating head. I think it might be related to the realistic armors modpack thing since females also get the fancy camo pattern on the base "armor"). Shows up fine on the combat screen (unless its not supposed to look the same as jackal armor)

Xenopedia entries for at least the following are not showing as well: Landing ship core disassembly and the keeper gun (I think it was the vortex rifle weapon research?). There were several others as well, but I'm not sure what they are.

Edited August 23, 2014 by fu12

[Theon Greyjoy]

In matter of congratulating Xenopedia writer, I must join in and give props to whomever wrote the descriptions for Vipers as well. I was initially worried because their original description involved something silly like Caesan planet-scape and "Protean alliance" (how do we know all this stuff anyway?) but the actual Xenopedia entry is quite well-written and somewhat believable.

In fact, the guy who created that new description deserves my congratulations 'cause that was some dark heavy stuff! Hahaha!

Thanks guys! It's nice to know sb is still reading/enjoying that stuff. I was responsible for xenopedia and aircrafts at the time. Im not working on anymore Xenonauts modding but I do visit from time to time. Kudos to the Xnt team and players!