The strategy of the game. Concept.

[Komandos]

10 minutes ago, Kamehamehayes said:

16 soldiers is generally my limit in terms of tactical enjoyment; any more soldiers will just start to make the game more and more of a slog imo when it was fun and enjoyable before.

1.

16 soldiers is the minimum for me. 16 soldiers can still be divided into 4 tactical groups. But I prefer to have 5 tactical groups on the battle map.

2. 

If the enemy is weak, then it is not necessary to assign a combat mission to the entire platoon. Make a move only with those soldiers who need combat experience and an increase in parameters.

3. 

On the contrary, I find that it is much more difficult to kill an alien with 8 barrels than with 16 barrels. And 20-24 barrels located in strategically important areas of the map make the game exciting and not stressful even with a threefold numerical superiority of the enemy. The more fighters in a tactical group, the higher the firepower of that tactical group. It's like a more powerful cannon in the hands of the player-commander.

Better to have one battle in which 20-24 of your soldiers will destroy 40-48 aliens.

Than to spend two battles in a row, where 10-12 of your soldiers will destroy 20-24 aliens.

 

[Komandos]

1 hour ago, Kamehamehayes said:

Increasing the soldier count to 20-24 is pretty ludicrous in the context of most players’ experiences, even if there is technically enough room in the drop ship to support that many soldiers.

Most players are experienced with game settings in which the range of sight does not exceed the radius of the grenade throw. As a result, players are forced to move their soldiers in dense crowds (phalanxes), half the AP. Which is not very fun and pleasant anymore.

Increase your visibility area by only 1.5 times and you can already run further, run less (without having to look into all the dark nooks and crannies). And fire contact with the enemy is provided at almost every step.

Night battles are even more difficult (due to low visibility). And with a low firepower of the entire detachment (weak weapons, few soldiers) - for me this is the highest difficulty (which quickly tires).

[Komandos]

The same "battle stress" problem that Chris presents - as a player, I can reduce the stress on some of my soldiers (came under fire, etc.) - simply by increasing the size of the battle group.

[Komandos]

3 hours ago, Kamehamehayes said:

Generally, 10-16 soldiers is considered pretty complex for a tactical game. It can already take minutes to plan out optimal moves and it is a good middle ground to balance complexity and still not become tedious and unenjoyable.

If you approach the solution of a combat mission as a Detachment commander, then yes: 10-16 is a lot for a detachment.

If we approach the solution of a combat mission as a Platoon commander, then the classic division "into 5-7 regiments" (the detachments) have not been canceled. The presence of a reserve (for example 16 + 4) will not complicate the game in any way. Vice versa. The reserve will only make life easier for the player in a too difficult combat situation.

Edited December 10, 2021 by Komandos

[Komandos]

4 hours ago, Alienkiller said:

I told about Xenonauts 2, UFO-ET-Series, Phoenix Point and Fan-Projects,

Xenonauts 2.

I saw the stream

https://youtu.be/Lrkv1oIHMKQ

The battle tactics are no different from the battle tactics in Xenonauts 1.

UFO-ET

I liked the research tree, but there are too few soldiers for serious battles. Playing with a small amount is hard, long and boring.

Phoenix Point

I watched streams on YouTube. Phoenix Point - an RPG game that uses firearms instead of swords. A more developed model of social relations is lacking for a full-fledged role-playing game.

[Komandos]

If you make the size of the Base not 6x6, but 12x12, then outwardly nothing will change. Living quarters that used to be 1x1 will become 2x2. Hangars that used to be 2x2 will now be 4x4. However, it will be possible to make 3x3 rooms; 3x4; 2x3 and even 1x1 (small warehouses, small radars, garages, etc.).

[Alienkiller]

We will see. Everything is in Beta-Status and can switch very quickly.

Maybe we get small / medium special Bases as the Outposts we tested already, Bases like in Phoenix Point, buyable Outposts in different Sizes like in X-COM Apocalypse or an complete new Concept.

The only thing I can´t see anymore is the old Base-Buildup where you have to pay 1.000.000 Credits only for Ground and then slowly build up your Base step by step for another 5.000.000 to 6.000.000 Credits.

We all don´t know that and have to be patient with drinking Tea.

[Komandos]

3 hours ago, Alienkiller said:

The only thing I can´t see anymore is the old Base-Buildup where you have to pay 1.000.000 Credits only for Ground and then slowly build up your Base step by step for another 5.000.000 to 6.000.000 Credits.

We all don´t know that and have to be patient with drinking Tea.

In fact, in the event of a war with aliens, no one will demand money for renting land for the construction of defensive structures. And the soldiers will not demand huge fees to save themselves and their families from death. If you look closely at the financial side of the issue, then the earthlings have a typical mercenary army, which was created for colonial wars, coups, and not for protection from external aggression. For example: in the new version of X-COM (which was never created) the Gollop brothers were going to provide the soldiers with food rations. And all of this. The number of personnel at the Bases was limited by the food supplies at the Bases.

In fact, there is no reasonable limit on the size of the Base, other than the size of the interface window. The base, like the city, could potentially grow many kilometers. And the only limitation of its growth is economic and military expediency. It makes no sense to build thousands of airfields for thousands of aircraft in order to shoot down (for example) one UFO accidentally flown over Antarctica.

In X-COM 1-2, the economy (market) of planet Earth had no saturation limit. With an infinitely large Base, the player could build an infinitely large number of laboratories (for the development of new technologies), build an infinitely large number of workshops (factories), hire an infinitely large number of workers, produce an infinitely large number of laser cannons, sell them on a market with infinite purchasing power, and make an infinitely large amount of money.

Base Size in X-COM: 1-2 limited the player's production and trading options. (Profit from trading).

If initially the game will have a limited number of engineers and scientists (living on planet Earth); a limited number of cities in which you can produce and buy a limited number of goods, then an artificial limitation of the size of the xenonauts base in the game will not be needed.

 

In "X-COM: 3 Apocalypse" the Gollop brothers tried to create an economy similar to the one that now exists in many Strategies, but limited themselves to "stubs": the player could not hire more than 25 biologists, more than 25 nuclear scientists, more than 50 engineers , more than 100 soldiers. There was no explanation for this.

The city's economy was so shallow that it resembled a rural one. The sale of ten rifles dramatically saturates the market, and the purchase of 10 rifles creates an acute shortage in the market.

Edited December 16, 2021 by Komandos

[Komandos]

In X-COM: 3 Apocalypse, despite very tight limits on the number of construction sites on the base and the total number of bases themselves (6-7), all the usable rooms (which could be filled with labor) could easily fit into two or three bases.

There were many graphical, tactical and strategic innovations in the game, but artificial restrictions on the player's freedom and concern for him did not make X-COM: 3 more popular than the first two games.

There was no balance in X-COM: 3 Apocalypse, which made many innovations and restrictions meaningless.

Edited December 17, 2021 by Komandos

[Komandos]

I don't know if the developers read the whole forum or not, so I duplicate the following post:

https://www.goldhawkinteractive.com/forums/index.php?/topic/19643-random-thought-about-the-importance-of-the-main-squad-storywise/&do=findComment&comment=183330

here:

 

The problem is that while one (single) player's battle group flies around the globe for several days to eliminate 10 "crash sites", the alien battle groups sit motionless all these days and do nothing.

If the "UFO crash site" gets the opportunity to cause damage to the region (at the crash site) every hour (every half hour), then the player will think:

What is more profitable?

1. Use one battle group that (on average) gets to the crash site in 10 hours (for example), but the region takes 1000 damage.

2. Use five battle groups that (on average) will reach the crash site in 2 hours (for example), and the region will take (in 2 hours) 200 damage.

Total:

"UFO crash site" every hour (every minute) should cause damage (damage) to the region in which it is located.

There is also a "UFO landing site": every minute it must inflict damage (damage) to the region in which it is located.

[Alienkiller]

Like said, don´t think to make the Development much longer as it is atm with so Tertiary-Things. We all wanna (Devs, Founders / Betatesters) bring an excellent Open-Beta, which is the Early-Access-Version, to the Community.

Let us bring in the already tested and Upgraded / Reworked / Refited Features in again as well as important missing Features to make the World Map / Base Management / Soldier Management and so on more interessting (like the Stress-System, Outposts, Missions and such) and all Gapfillers get closed.

In an DLC we can then think about an Rework / Refit from Xenonauts 2 with missing secondary and some interessting tertiary Features coming in.

The Concern about the Game is not here in the Forum and the Ideas here get discussed. It´s the Community on other Platforms (and to 95 % Steam), which isn´t ammused to wait much longer. That´s the Concern we have to think about. So the Main-Importance is to fill the Gaps (R & D, Info-Boxes etc.), implement the special Features / already testet Features for Missions, World Map, Management etc. and make Xenonauts Early-Access-Ready.

Edited December 20, 2021 by Alienkiller

[nikjas183]

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[Komandos]

On 12/10/2021 at 8:16 PM, Kamehamehayes said:

16 soldiers is generally my limit in terms of tactical enjoyment; any more soldiers will just start to make the game more and more of a slog imo when it was fun and enjoyable before.

Games in which soldiers of 8-10 players comb the map to find and destroy 8-10 enemy soldiers are too monotonous and do not have enough dynamics (most of the moves are spent searching for the enemy, not the battle itself). Games in which there are 20-24 player soldiers on the map, and (20-24-48) enemy soldiers - there are more dynamic ones, since the player enters the battle immediately, there is fire contact with the enemy on each turn, there is no need to spend a lot of time searching for the enemy.

[Komandos]

In the tactical part of the game, the soldiers' panic depends on the number of casualties among the player's soldiers, the influence of the leader nearby and the impact on the soldiers of the aliens' psionic abilities. In the strategic part of Xenonauts 2, the panic mechanism is not so obvious. There is no panic of individual cities (due to the irradiation of the city, with the help of UFOs, psionics). The peaks of panic in the states are poorly combined with the peaks of victims in this country. The leaders of these countries practically do not suppress panic (they are not working to suppress it). Although theoretically: on a global scale, people are affected by exactly the same panic mechanics as on the battlefield.

[Kamehamehayes]

19 minutes ago, Komandos said:

Games in which soldiers of 8-10 players comb the map to find and destroy 8-10 enemy soldiers are too monotonous and do not have enough dynamics (most of the moves are spent searching for the enemy, not the battle itself). Games in which there are 20-24 player soldiers on the map, and (20-24-48) enemy soldiers - there are more dynamic ones, since the player enters the battle immediately, there is fire contact with the enemy on each turn, there is no need to spend a lot of time searching for the enemy.

For every mission in xenonauts and xenonauts 2, there is an alternative way of winning a mission than to kill every alien. For ufos and alien bases, you can take control of the ufo/control room for 5 turns and win the mission. And for missions like terror mission and base defenses that actually require eliminating all the aliens, you can wait 15 turns to have the map and aliens revealed to you or easily predict where the aliens are in your base because they prioritize the command center respectively. 

Having to process the moves of 20+ units plus that of the aliens has too much cognitive load and is not feasible or fun for most players. Most individual turns will take forever and missions will probably take more turns overall, breaking the pacing and making the tactical battles a slog to get through imo. I don't need Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn long player and alien turns for every battle. The only way to make the cognitive load less is to rely on simpler strategies like turtling, overwatch camping, putting the whole squad into one huge group to effortlessly win every firefight, etc, which inherently makes the game less interesting and does not reward more efficient and effective play, which are the main things I want from most tactics games. 

[Komandos]

12 minutes ago, Kamehamehayes said:

Having to process the moves of 20+ units plus that of the aliens has too much cognitive load and is not feasible or fun for most players.

 

The innovations you mentioned (which are listed below (quote)) - carry an additional cognitive load on the player's brain. Not all players want to solve such complex intellectual tasks.

12 minutes ago, Kamehamehayes said:

For every mission in xenonauts and xenonauts 2, there is an alternative way of winning a mission than to kill every alien. For ufos and alien bases, you can take control of the ufo/control room for 5 turns and win the mission. And for missions like terror mission and base defenses that actually require eliminating all the aliens, you can wait 15 turns to have the map and aliens revealed to you or easily predict where the aliens are in your base because they prioritize the command center respectively. 

 

Edited August 28, 2022 by Komandos

[Kamehamehayes]

They don't add very much cognitive load at all. It is just one descision after all. It's choosing to take the ufo and wait or wait out 15 turns to see the whole map. It isn't very intellectually taxing in the slightest. I'd argue that it is less taxing than normal play because you don't have to look for the remaining aliens in the dark. 

You also don't have to go out of your way to do many of these alternative win conditions either. You are certainly going to breach the ufo, take the command center, and eliminate all the aliens in terror and base defence missions, now all you have to do is make the decision to wait. You can ignore all these win conditions as well; there is nothing forcing the player to do them if they don't want to.

[Komandos]

Idea:

After every UFO shot down, aliens experience a lot of stress. This stress will reduce their moral characteristics. As soon as the stress of the aliens reaches 100% stress, the aliens break down and take a pause of several weeks to recover.

Edited August 28, 2022 by Komandos

[Komandos]

1 hour ago, Kamehamehayes said:

You can ignore all these win conditions as well; there is nothing forcing the player to do them if they don't want to.

If I don't want to take too few (8-16) soldiers on a tactical mission, can I ignore this winning condition and take a little more soldiers (20-24)??? Will the game force me to fulfill this condition if I don't want to?

[Kamehamehayes]

19 minutes ago, Komandos said:

If I don't want to take too few (8-16) soldiers on a tactical mission, can I ignore this winning condition and take a little more soldiers (20-24)??? Will the game force me to fulfill this condition if I don't want to?

If the game is innately built around 8-16 soldiers per mission, than taking 20-24 soldiers will break the game balance. A similar thing will happen if 20-24 soldiers was the cap. If I don't want to take 20+ soldiers into battle then I would be handicapping myself and probably would not get very far that way. It's a balancing thing, and changing an important resource like the number of soldiers you bring will have a massive effect on how the game is played. And with the new modular armor, many new toys, and new vehicles all with different loadouts and innate abilities, 20-24 soldiers will be harder to manage than it would be in Xcom or Xen 1. 

I guess technically you can pretty effortlessly change the max amount of soldiers brought into a mission by changing a couple values if you want to though. Play how you want. 

[Komandos]

13 hours ago, Kamehamehayes said:

If the game is innately built around 8-16 soldiers per mission, than taking 20-24 soldiers will break the game balance.

The player wins all ground battles anyway. If: the player wins all ground battles anyway, then increasing the soldiers on the mission will not change the balance of the game.

[Komandos]

14 hours ago, Kamehamehayes said:

If I don't want to take 20+ soldiers into battle then I would be handicapping myself and probably would not get very far that way. It's a balancing thing, and changing an important resource like the number of soldiers you bring will have a massive effect on how the game is played.

If a player has accumulated enough strategic resources to be able to send 20-24 soldiers to battle instead of 8-10, then why should the game prohibit the realization of a strategic advantage on the battlefield?

If I have advanced so far that I can afford a more fun and easy tactical mission mode, then why should I still fight with minimal human resources, as at the beginning of the game?

 

P.S.

A good game is good because it can turn into a "sandbox game" for an experienced player at easy levels.

Edited August 29, 2022 by Komandos

[Komandos]

15 hours ago, Kamehamehayes said:

It's a balancing thing, and changing an important resource like the number of soldiers you bring will have a massive effect on how the game is played.

The imbalance of the game is that the game allows you to indefinitely increase the number of aliens on the tactical map, but does not allow you to increase the number of soldiers to a tactical minimum of 5-7 units (LEFT FLANK. CENTRAL. RIGHT FLANK. MOBILE RESERVE. HEAVY WEAPONS. SPECIALISTS (doctors, engineers, sappers, etc.)).

[Komandos]

As soon as the Earth's air defense forces shoot down an alien shuttle, an alien evacuation group rushes to the crash site. An alien evacuation group takes the crew and all artifacts (except UFOs). Now the player must hurry to the UFO crash site, even if the mission takes place at night.

[Komandos]

I suggest adding the color coding of the player's soldiers (squads).