Three basic graphical features

[Gudadantza]

Hi all. i am new here. I am seriously thinking about preorder the game and probably it will occur when the new alpha 14 is available. The game is going better and better and the graphical direction of 2d drawings is something I love.

But I have three basic features I´d like to see in game although probably some of you will consider them not important things.

First of all: a shadow under the tank. It can be considered a nonsense but graphically it is something that make graphics more solid considering the that the rest of entities in game have shadows.

Something that should be more time consuming but great, should be animated soldiers and civilians/aliens when they are static. I mean, the sprite watches left and right in a loop or moves slightly the body. It would show a lot of quality in the game. Drawings in movement.

And finally I think soldiers should be capable to watch the corners, of course, wasting movement points. This last one is more gameplay than graphic feature and could be very tactical.

Greetings.

[Swe_Racoon]

You can watch corners, it's called Reaction Fire. That's what TU Reserve slider is for.

As for the rest, I don't mind that the sprites aren't animated, and generally shadows are the first to go when I'm trying to improve performance. Each to his own, of course, I do think you should preorder the game though, V14 is just around the corner.

[Gorlom]

Hello and welcome to the forum Gudadantza

Personally I think that idle animations will get tiresome really quickly. Looking at riding in WoW for example it annoyes the crap out of me that my character keep looking over his shoulder every 10 steps his mount takes.

It will also break my immersion for me since I see everything as happening somewhat simultaneously and that whenever something isn't happening time is frozen. If they have time to stand around looking left and right all the time why aren't they doing something more productive. Especially if they have an alien right in front of them. Why are they looking elsewhere? and why aren't they firing?

If it gets put into the game I really hope that I can turn it off as I think it's a horrible feature.

When you say looking at corners do you mean looking around corners without going into the open or do you mean that they react if something comes around the corner?

[Gauddlike]

The extra sprites required to animate a small position change would make it very unlikely to happen.

Shadows under other sprites are a pretty new thing still so I imagine vehicle shadows are on the drawing board.

They should keep the theme running between sprites.

If by watching corners you mean being able to lean around them to fire without putting themselves in danger that has already been ruled out.

It was thought to limit risk without adding enough to balance it out.

[Gudadantza]

Hello and welcome to the forum Gudadantza

When you say looking at corners do you mean looking around corners without going into the open or do you mean that they react if something comes around the corner?

I mean looking around corners without being totally exposed or without going in the open as you say.

The old xcom legacy was too artificial in that sense. As an example I can speak about the doors. In The first xcom you should have to be exposed in the next tile to open the door, in Terror from the deep they changed that. And it was an improvement.

The idea of the corners is something similar.

Greetings

[Gorlom]

How/what did they change exactly ? And in hat way was it an improvement?

Are you talking about being able to only look around corners or to shoot around them as well?

[Gauddlike]

The improvement was right clicking doors so you didn't have to walk through them.

[Gudadantza]

How/what did they change exactly ? And in hat way was it an improvement?

Are you talking about being able to only look around corners or to shoot around them as well?

Do you need to enter in a room to open a door in xenonauts? I guess not, in TFTD it worked with the right mouse button instead of crossing the door to the next tile and getting exposed as in the first game. This is, opening the door without moving the soldier.

And about shooting or just looking around the corner I consider there are a lot of options and I´d be happy with any choose. But It could work as a standard AP use: if you have AP´s left, you can shoot. You would have some cover and visuals but maybe less accuracy.

Or it could work as a visual feature only, wasting all the AP of the soldier.

Greetings.

[Gudadantza]

The extra sprites required to animate a small position change would make it very unlikely to happen.

If by watching corners you mean being able to lean around them to fire without putting themselves in danger that has already been ruled out.

It was thought to limit risk without adding enough to balance it out.

Yes, that was what I mean.

Ok, It is a shame to hear that. My point of view is that the implementation of flexible and intuitive actions like looking around a corner create immersion and realism in a game like this. But the design choosings are inevitable.

My great hopes for this gem and Greetings

[Max_Caine]

The nature of a turn-based system works against such a system as you propose. In a real-time game, a squaddie poking his head arond a corner takes a specific amount of time, in which time the opponent can respond simultaneously. But in a turn-based system, the degree of response is necessarily limited to a (possibly small) percent chance for a reaction. Too little risk, for too much reward.

[Gudadantza]

I do not agree at all. nothing to do with the nature of a turn based game.

The risks and rewards of a feature could be tweaked and coded if that supposed feature does interest in a game.

The soldier looking around the corner could suffer a reaction shot or not, or be with no AP left or not, could be safe and with a chance of shoot down a new objective or not.

If that movement needs to be more risky it is coded and tweaked. The nature of a game is programmed.

Sorry but the fact of turning a corner in three tiles and being neccesarily exposed by supposed old rules is something I do not understand nowadays.

But is an old defect I felt in my favourite games. I just was wondering if this time it could be changed. Nothing more, I am sure I will love this game.

Greetings

[Gauddlike]

The problem for me is that once you can see the enemy anybody on the map with no intervening obstructions can shoot that enemy, regardless of if they can actually see them.

If you can peep round corners and remain safe then scouting is far less risky and the enemy is in just as much danger.

To balance it you could make anyone who cannot see that specific target take a penalty to accuracy.

Doesn't feel worthwhile to me though.

I would put it on the nice to have pile.

[Max_Caine]

Gudadantza, if you assert that "nothing to do with the nature of a turn based game", then you are going to have to say why it's nothing to do with it being a turn based game. Stating that a feature under consideration can be tweaked is meaningless. If the necessary tweaking negatively affects other portions of the game then the feature shouldn't have been considered in the first place. If tweaking creates a dissonance with the player (where the player says "hang on, that isn't right"), then again, the feature shouldn't have been considered.

Now, I can show you that a turn based game in this instance does indeed have certain limits to risk and reward inherant to its structure as a type of game.

The first question to ask is: what is the purpose of being able to lean around a corner? There are two purposes. Firstly, to be able to gather information with minimum risk to the person gathering that information. Secondly, to be able to engage enemies with minimum risk to the person engaging the enemy.

In a real time environment (say, Afterlight or Aftershock), a friendly unit requires a certain amount of time to lean around a corner. Then if the player wants to engage the enemy, a certain amount of time to prepare a weapon, then a certain amount of time to fire that weapon. Even though the player is taking the minimum risk option, there are still risks inherant because in the time required to do these things, the player's opponent can respond. The opponent can move units away, or prepare to shoot back, or hide behind cover.

In a turn based environment, the opponent does not have these options. Typically, the only option an opponent may have is to shoot back with reaction shot - if the opponent had a reaction shot ready. If the purpose of leaning around a corner is simply to gather information, then the player has information with the absolute minimum risk to his squaddie, because the opponent has so very few options to respond with. Equally, if the player then uses the squaddie leaning to shoot, then again, this is the minimum risk option to the player. To tweak it in this instance, you could take on of several options:

1) Grossly exagurate the AP cost of leaning.

2) Grossly exagurate the chance of reaction fire on leaning.

3) Grossly exagurate the AP cost of firing when leaning.

4) Enable the opponent to take more actions in reaction.

With 1) and 3), if the cost of leaning is too high, then it will never be used. Otherwise, a good player will make allowance for the amount of AP required to lean, and still benefit from it. With 2), if the chance of reaction fire is too high, then again, players will not use it. In any case, it would certainly be complained that "why does showing part of your body have a better chance to reaction fire than showing all of it?". With 4) you change the nature of the game completely, and have to go back to the design boards.

[Gudadantza]

The problem for me is that once you can see the enemy anybody on the map with no intervening obstructions can shoot that enemy, regardless of if they can actually see them.

If you can peep round corners and remain safe then scouting is far less risky and the enemy is in just as much danger.

To balance it you could make anyone who cannot see that specific target take a penalty to accuracy.

Doesn't feel worthwhile to me though.

I would put it on the nice to have pile.

I agree with you. So some tweakings should be done as:

-The enemy could have the same advantages or disadvantages of the same system. Lean corners.

-Or The corner should be relatively safe not 100 per cent safe.

-Or Staying in the corner coud be very AP expensive.

-Or Staying in the corner could bring accuracy penalties.

Or all of them. Lot of approaches or ideas.

-----------

But What I really mean is that it is just an idea, a possible solution to the absurd act of making a turn in a corner exposing the body for the sake of an inflexible rule, absurd as was the act of going through a room to open a door. And it wasn´t the nature of a supposed turn based game.

For god´s sake if That idea is evil, another solution could be some kind of strafing. At least with that, the movement would be one tile/step sideways but at least looking at the possible menace´s direction.

Greetings.

[Khall]

You know that you can face your soldier in any direction by right clicking where you want him to face.

Sorry but the fact of turning a corner in three tiles and being neccesarily exposed by supposed old rules is something I do not understand nowadays.

You don't need to go completely around a corner to see, you can move one tile from the corner and face down it (turning around doesn't trigger reaction fire) which is similar to a strafe system.

[Tam Elbrun]

why not just add a strafe option like he said? something like 'shift + click to move without turning' that chews up more ap than walking normally but less than the walk-stop-turn-walk-stop-turn method of checking side paths?

[Max_Caine]

Ah well, good question. Why not add a strafe option? I would presume because a side-step animation couldn't be justified in the amount of work and resources required to animate it, and it would look distinctly odd without the appropriate animation. Bear in mind there aren't armour facings, so being shot in the side is the same as being shot in the front.

[Jean-Luc]

Sprite animation puts a pretty definite damper on a lot of things including leaning and strafing.

[Gudadantza]

Bear in mind there aren't armour facings, so being shot in the side is the same as being shot in the front.

but that is not the point.

I think being shot by a non detected alien is not the same as detect an alien while the soldier is moving. And is not the same exposing yourself in a corner looking at one direction to inevitably exposing yourself while looking at other direction.

Of course every feature and animation needs work and a lot of work. But is the game complete yet?

Greetings.

[Gudadantza]

You know that you can face your soldier in any direction by right clicking where you want him to face.

You don't need to go completely around a corner to see, you can move one tile from the corner and face down it (turning around doesn't trigger reaction fire) which is similar to a strafe system.

Are you sure that one tile movement and then turning the soldier does not trigger reaction fire? I mean, should it be different than moving the one tile forward and then one rightwards?

If that is true I have nothing more to say except that the supposed gameplay problem I am speaking about would not be a problem. If that is true I can be happy with that part of the game.

Greetings!

[Max_Caine]

Well, when I say "couldn't be justified", what I mean to say is "It isn't likely that Chris is going to spend the time and money to have rendered out, hand painted, tested and prepared side-step spritesheets for all six armour sets in all the cardinal directions with all weapon and off-hand combinations when he hasn't even got the current spritesheets complete nor will they likely to be complete before the beta".

Quite a while back, a chap called Nutss asked about the animation process. Jean-luc might remember this conversation. It turns out there's an obscene amount of work that goes into spritesheet creation, and it's one of the biggest drains in terms of time, energy and money, especially for Xenonauts because there are so many variations on spritesheet creation to consider. Every new animation for a Xenonaut has to be very carefully considered (anyone remember the kerfuffle around implementing manual kneeling?) So, personally, I couldn't see it happen.

Edited August 28, 2012 by Max_Caine

[Khall]

Are you sure that one tile movement and then turning the soldier does not trigger reaction fire? I mean, should it be different than moving the one tile forward and then one rightwards?

If that is true I have nothing more to say except that the supposed gameplay problem I am speaking about would not be a problem. If that is true I can be happy with that part of the game.

Greetings!

The tile movement may trigger reaction fire but the soldier turning won't. When you do an action (apart from stationary turning) while in the alien's line of sight there is a chance of triggering reaction fire. So moving one tile and turning is less risky than moving 2 tiles around a corner, simply because you are only chancing it once compared to two times.

Also it is cheaper. Turning a soldier costs 1 AP per orientation (N to NE costs 1AP, N to SE costs 3AP) and moving to a tile costs 4AP (more if turning is required). So moving one tile and turning 90 degrees is 6 AP, compared to moving completely around a corner which costs 10AP (and is more expensive and risky to retreat back around the corner).

[Gudadantza]

The tile movement may trigger reaction fire but the soldier turning won't. When you do an action (apart from stationary turning) while in the alien's line of sight there is a chance of triggering reaction fire. So moving one tile and turning is less risky than moving 2 tiles around a corner, simply because you are only chancing it once compared to two times.

Also it is cheaper. Turning a soldier costs 1 AP per orientation (N to NE costs 1AP, N to SE costs 3AP) and moving to a tile costs 4AP (more if turning is required). So moving one tile and turning 90 degrees is 6 AP, compared to moving completely around a corner which costs 10AP (and is more expensive and risky to retreat back around the corner).

Ok, but I see the principal problem is still there. You trigger reaction fire with the first movement blindly, without option to know or defend.

If that is the case or must be the case then I consider justice at least some partial cover.

And that is the principal sense of strafing or leaning around a corner.

Greetings

[Gorlom]

Ok, but I see the principal problem is still there. You trigger reaction fire with the first movement blindly, without option to know or defend.

If that is the case or must be the case then I consider justice at least some partial cover.

And that is the principal sense of strafing or leaning around a corner.

Greetings

It doesn't make any difference. You wouldn't be able to do anything if you strafed or leaned around the corner either.

Not without making the action counter intuitive or too beneficial so as to it hurts the flow of the game (ie makes it overpowered)

In fact not seeing who fires the shot might be more interesting from the devs perspective since it contributes to the feel Chris is after. Its a powerful tool to set the atmosphere rather than a problem.

[Gudadantza]

It doesn't make any difference. You wouldn't be able to do anything if you strafed or leaned around the corner either.

Not without making the action counter intuitive or too beneficial so as to it hurts the flow of the game (ie makes it overpowered)

In fact not seeing who fires the shot might be more interesting from the devs perspective since it contributes to the feel Chris is after. Its a powerful tool to set the atmosphere rather than a problem.

Not seeing who fires the shot is one of the most interesting parts of xcom-like games and there exist a lot of situations like this in which the player tries to be cautous to evade that situation.

But if you suspect there is an alien behind a corner and the only way to discover it is getting exposed in the open it is not interesting or intuitive, it is a defect. A bad legacy.

Greetings

edit: oh, and I forgot. Of course would be a difference between strafe/lean or go in the open: partial cover of the soldier.

Edited August 29, 2012 by Gudadantza