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aircraft : missile slot -> drop tank ; repair -> loose max HP


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Hi there,

I know I didn't see the finished game, and maybe this was already suggested by the time, but :

when I played Xenonauts, I was surprised there is no option to replace a missile by a fuel drop tank, in order to increase the range of airfighters... A lot of disadvantages could be added (lower max speed, less efficient roll manoeuver, increased vulnerability to small round) but maybe it would be worth it in comparison to the bonus in operation range. In this regards, aerial refuelling could be an option, but I think it is too complicated...

Moreover, I think any time an airplane is repaired, its maximum life should be decreased by 1%. So the "perfect" dogfight would be always a challenge, and it is reasonnable to admit that a "pristine" aircraft is always better than one that have been repaired 60 times...

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Hi there,

I know I didn't see the finished game, and maybe this was already suggested by the time, but :

when I played Xenonauts, I was surprised there is no option to replace a missile by a fuel drop tank, in order to increase the range of airfighters... A lot of disadvantages could be added (lower max speed, less efficient roll manoeuver, increased vulnerability to small round) but maybe it would be worth it in comparison to the bonus in operation range. In this regards, aerial refuelling could be an option, but I think it is too complicated...

Moreover, I think any time an airplane is repaired, its maximum life should be decreased by 1%. So the "perfect" dogfight would be always a challenge, and it is reasonnable to admit that a "pristine" aircraft is always better than one that have been repaired 60 times...

Welcome to the forums!

I wouldn't want lower speed, as they already have a hard time catching up to the enemy. But it's a neat idea. Though the loss of firepower might be balancing enough. :P

I don't think it's reasonable enough. If you change everything that was damaged, the aircraft is in pretty good shape. Not to mention that this would be an arbitrary mechanic, without real repercussions simply because you'll be switching out your fleet before too long with new designs based on alien technology. And such a pursuit of realism would then be wasted and personally I don't see the fun factor.

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About the drop tank I agree with IceVamp, that the loss of firepower seems balancing. I was just suggesting idea, in case they can be usefull/convincing...

About damage I do not agree with IceVamp, because : okay you are likely to change aircraft sooner or later, but that is the point : if you do not play well enough, you may have to buy/produce new aircraft BEFORE you developped new ones by research... On the other hand, a good player may skip this expense, and that is what is fun : feeling that you have a reward for playing well/taking risk...

Anyway : many thanks for your response IceVamp ! And thanks for welcoming :)

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Drop tanks are a good idea, but will probably only be valuable to early-tier interceptors, and in the early game. There are late-tier interceptors that will be available for research and manufacture and I’m willing to bet that they will have bigger fuel reserves and a longer operational time. And, by the time you get to producing later-tier interceptors, it’s likely you’ll have several bases, covering a larger area of the geoscape, negating the need for drop tanks.

Regarding the % damage issue, it really depends upon the barriers to getting an interceptor. The barrier to getting a new F-17 is money. The barriers to getting a new MiG are manufacturing costs, transportation costs, manufacturing time and transportation time. With more barriers in place to getting a later-tier interceptor, would players appreciate the difference between factory-fresh and war-torn, or would they become annoyed that their investment in money, time and the opportunity wasted in other manufacturing projects that could have been taken instead will slowly sink down the plughole of depreciation?

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I don't get the desire for longer interceptor range. I think there's a danger that getting what you want isn't really going to be as fun as you thought... Would you be ok with the standard range being reduced to compensate for "extra" range from tanks so that the max range doesn't change? Are you only after the extended range so it would work just as well if the standard range was increased? Is the tank and the included downsides an attempt to compensate and thereby preempt objections? Or does it acctually bring something to the game?

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Once I suggested aircraft (or maybe it was tanks) be given one or more "equipment slot" for jammers, extra fuel, etc. Would add a lot to the game, especially the devs got creative and made us some cool gizmos we could research and build for our air forces in the mid- and late-game.

Gorlom: one way to implement drop tanks would be to have them reduce both the aircraft's maximum speed and its agility in dogfights. This would be coupled with a "jettison drop tank" order in the dogfighting screen, which would allow the fighter to release the tank at the beginning of combat, as they do in real life. Dropping the tank would remove the penalty to speed, turn rate and perhaps the barrel roll maneuver, but would of course reduce the fighter's fuel level. So you would have the increased range, but it would be balanced out by the fact that the player would face a dilemma when UFOs were spotted or engaged -- drop the tank and risk running out of fuel, or keep it attached and suffer the agility penalty to the fighter?

Of course, there's also the fact that if the game gave you more than one gizzmo to add to the Equipment slot, putting a fuel tank under the belly of the fighter would mean foregoing the benefits of a jammer or countermeasure device or whatever else was available to you ;) .

Moreover, I think any time an airplane is repaired, its maximum life should be decreased by 1%.
Now, stuff like this I can definitely love. Not neccessarily this exact idea, but a kind of "vehicle/aircraft degradation" model that made new assets perform better than old ones. Would fit the general atmosphere of the game so well, and add a kind of Star Wars-ish "used universe" feel to the game (remember how much charm and "personality" the Millenium Falcon had precisely because she wasn't perfect and didn't always work as intended?). If you implemented parts of the fighter wearing out or taking damage, either permanently or temporarily, that would lead to some cool situations and dilemmas, too ("should I launch this interceptor even though her starboard missile slot is damaged?").

As a matter of fact, couldn't you make a new thread for this? I'm not a dev, of course, but I personally think this is an idea that merits more attention! :)

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That doesn't relate to anything I said safer-keeper.

As a matter of fact, couldn't you make a new thread for this? I'm not a dev, of course, but I personally think this is an idea that merits more attention!

Isn't that exactly what he did?

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That doesn't relate to anything I said safer-keeper.
Oh, I'm sorry. Pardon me for stating my opinion.
Isn't that exactly what he did?
I see no thread for the suggestion, so no, apparently he hasn't.

Anyways,

Tbh I think vehicle/aircraft degradation would only serve to frustrate players and encourage reloads to maintain pristine condition. Planes cost a lot in upkeep for good reason.
That would depend entirely on how they're implemented. If it's a percentage chance based on damage, then yes, it might be frustrating and "unfun" on some level and encourage players who don't have Ironman enabled to load an earlier save. I believe the added immersion and the decisions it would cause the player to have to make (hold onto old fighters that have seen better days or invest in a replacement) would be well worth it, though.
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Well... Safe-Keeper, if the investment in making a replacement involves:

- Tying up my manufacturing facilities while I build a new one

- Paying through the nose to build one

- Using up my stocks of alienium and alien alloys to build a new one

- Waiting however long for a new one to be built

- Paying for my new craft to have it transported

- Waiting for my new craft to be transported to the base I scrapped the old one at

- Swearing as an alien fightercraft shoots down my transporter....

Yeah, I'd think that was unfun. And very annoying that I would have to periodically do this.

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Oh, I'm sorry. Pardon me for stating my opinion.

... You are free to state your opinion but you directed it towards me specifically. You started the paragraph with "Gorlom:" Which made me a bit confused when it didn't relate to what I said at all.

As I thought you were talking to me I responded. Could you understand why I responded in that way? That I wasn't trying to be rude, but merely point out that If you were talking to me that didn't relate to anything I was talking about.

I see no thread for the suggestion, so no, apparently he hasn't.

... what about THIS thread? He is the thread starter and you are quoting his first post. :confused:

Edited by Gorlom
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I can see the frustrations of this outweighing the positives. For me the punishment for not doing well in interceptions is having the planes out of commission for x number of days. Isn't that sufficient? Max_Caine makes a good list of the other frustrations?

I'm happy to believe that as part of the repair and maintenance, the craft are overhauled if need be, to ensure they are at the peak of performance.

I'd really like to see as much variety in the craft as possible, looking towards Apocalypse type of craft. That would really add more to the game - shields, engine types and more varied armaments would all be good.

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I like the idea of a drop tank that can take the place of a weapon. Or perhaps aircraft can have mod points (in addition to hard points), for other such add-ons. Your chinnook could also have these (drop tanks would be invaluable).

Drop tanks for longer range.

ECM/ECCM/Radiation scanners for searching for UFO's/Bases/Activity.

Defensive systems (flares, chaff, alien-tech) for defeating missiles or enemy weaponry.

Afterburners for faster aircraft.

Deployment packages specifically for transports, such as flare-droppers in night missions, or field scanners that give a 1-turn indicator of likely locations of aliens, etc.

Etc.

Drop tanks would be invaluable early game, when you can't afford global coverage. Likewise, on a chinook you might have to balance between a drop tank (to get your best guys to further destinations) or a defensive package (so they get there safely).

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well, i would agree with drop tanks, would be nice to have ( about parameter degradation: they were called rdrop tanks, cos they were suposed to be jettisoned before combat to prevent that) also adding more slots that could be used for ECM pods or otther E-War equipment would be nice

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I like idea of drop tanks that increase range at the cost of speed and / or weapons loadout. However I can pretty much assure you that pilot (if he/she is sane) will automatically jettison the tanks as soon as combat begins. So it will definitely increase the outbound range, but that's it.

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Well... Safe-Keeper, if the investment in making a replacement involves:

- Tying up my manufacturing facilities while I build a new one

- Paying through the nose to build one

- Using up my stocks of alienium and alien alloys to build a new one

- Waiting however long for a new one to be built

- Paying for my new craft to have it transported

- Waiting for my new craft to be transported to the base I scrapped the old one at

- Swearing as an alien fightercraft shoots down my transporter....

Yeah, I'd think that was unfun. And very annoying that I would have to periodically do this.

It wouldn't have to happen all that often. This all comes down to balance, really. Of course if you had to throw out interceptors more often than teens replace their cell phones, it'd get annoying and tedious really quick. But if this degradation happened gradually, over a long time, and you only had to replace fighters once in a while... it'd just add depth and immersion to the game.

Would be especially emotional, for lack of a better word, if each fighter came with a "History" that showed which sorties it had been to, or just had UFO icons by its name (or painted on the fighter itself in the hangar screen) to denote how many craft it had shot down throughout its lifetime. The more of these "little touches" the devs added to make you emotionally attached to your fighters, the more it'd sting to finally have to throw one out.

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Vehicle degradation isn't a half bad idea, but making it permanent is unnecessary. I'd say a better idea would be to go ahead and implement it, but also give players the ability to overhaul the vehicle and restore lost performance. Doing so would take that craft out of service for a time, say 1-2 days given that the work would be performed by the best mechanics humanity has to offer, likely with plenty of spare parts to acquire. Perhaps even scale the overhaul time with how much work needs to be done. In addition, overhauling a vehicle would incur a monetary cost, in order to acquire the new parts necessary to rebuild the craft, but this cost would be, up to a certain point, dramatically less than purchasing a new aircraft, again scaled to how much actually needs done.

This could be further developed by having the overhaul cost and the replacement cost cross at some point, the idea being that after a certain threshold it's actually more expensive to overhaul an existing vehicle than to replace it. So why do it after that point? Perhaps adding a morale type of stat would be a good idea, measuring the operators level of attachment/confidence with that machine. It's a well known fact that operators develop a level of attachment to their equipment that can and often does affect their performance with said equipment; Hell X-Com itself is a good example of it. So by keeping a craft maintained, the operator maintains a higher level of performance with that craft as opposed to replacing it, reflecting the operator being more familiar with the quirks and nuances unique to that machine. In game mechanics, this could be reflected as a small bonus to performance, say 10% skill bonus. Combine that with the engagement history idea that Safe-Keeper had and that could be very cool.

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Drop tanks would be fine, but I could see forgoing them to make later fighters with alien tech feel even better.

The repair damage is a bad idea IMO, most of the time you'll catch at least a shot or two and leave a fight with 90%+ health. Maybe if a plane was damaged below 30% or something, but it just seems annoying to keep track of / handle in the UI.

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Fule tanks - make perfect sense. aircraft had those back then and have them now.

Degradation - no, it doens't make sense. Well mantained craft can work reliably for DECADES. Pointelss, useless machanic with negligible impact. Better spend time and resources on something better.

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