Win by holding UFO for 3 turns cuts the loot strange way - perhaps bug or itentional ?

[gG-Unknown]

Win by holding  UFO for 3  turns looks like a great idea, until I find it cuts my loot very strange way. Only corpses are missing. Is it correct ?

If I capture UFO, 3 Sebilians stay in a barn but I  get all their weapons they have.

If I found them in a barn, and kill them personally , I get their weapons AND their bodies.

Which means, if I win by holding UFO, we  make some kind  of deal with aliens, they hand over weapons and walk away ?

What is  your thought ?

 

Edited January 21 by gG-Unknown

[fusion-waffle]

Great comparison.

Purely from a game mechanic / player incentive perspective, it seems fair that if the player does not risk their soldiers to clear the whole map, they do not quite get the full reward.   Most of the value (~$750k?) is from recovering the UFO itself.  There's usually good money in selling alien junk, particularly the alien weapons, so letting the player recover the weapons that belonged to the aliens they didn't even eliminate is very generous.

 

Also entertaining question of how we'd explain or justify this within the game's universe.   Maybe after they realise those pesky xenonauts have captured their UFO and there's no going home, the barn lizards drop their guns and attempt to assimilate into the human community, applying for jobs at the local Smokey Joe's franchise, or starting their own construction company.

Edited January 21 by fusion-waffle

[Chris]

14 hours ago, gG-Unknown said:

Win by holding  UFO for 3  turns looks like a great idea, until I find it cuts my loot very strange way. Only corpses are missing. Is it correct ?

If I capture UFO, 3 Sebilians stay in a barn but I  get all their weapons they have.

If I found them in a barn, and kill them personally , I get their weapons AND their bodies.

Which means, if I win by holding UFO, we  make some kind  of deal with aliens, they hand over weapons and walk away ?

What is  your thought ?

 

You're right, yeah. This is a bug - if an alien survives you shouldn't get their weapons either.

We'll log it as a bug but it's quite a low priority one.

[gG-Unknown]

2 hours ago, Chris said:

You're right, yeah. This is a bug - if an alien survives you shouldn't get their weapons either.

We'll log it as a bug but it's quite a low priority one.

Thanks for the response, but it should be other way around.

Capturing UFO is the only  objective we have.

If player focuses at objective, you propose  that player should  be punished by  less skills for soldiers (less shooting and walking) and lower loot ? I say it diplomatically, that  is a  nonsense.

Capturing UFO should  be the best reward outcome  possible !

e.i. FIX : All the  loot, all the corpses and some bonus  XP for all survived soldiers as form of refund for less shooting. The bonus XP should be at least 2x higher then kill aliens by weapons, because of we fill up the objective.

This way a game designer do not push a player into tedious  search for "a last crab in a closet" TM, but rather give player a bonus for doing the fun stuff = breach the UFO ! THIS should be quite high on priority queue because it improves gameplay on root  level.

Thanks

 

Edited January 22 by gG-Unknown

[fusion-waffle]

On 1/22/2026 at 10:02 PM, gG-Unknown said:

Capturing UFO should  be the best reward outcome  possible !

I reckon 999 out of every 1000 Xenonauts 2 players will never be able to tell the difference and distinguish between (i) the current behaviour already in stable milestone 6, (ii) the behaviour Chris proposes (lizards escape with their guns), or (iii) the behaviour you advocate for (more in the player's favour).

[berk]

On 1/22/2026 at 1:02 PM, gG-Unknown said:

Thanks for the response, but it should be other way around.

Capturing UFO is the only  objective we have.

If player focuses at objective, you propose  that player should  be punished by  less skills for soldiers (less shooting and walking) and lower loot ? I say it diplomatically, that  is a  nonsense.

Capturing UFO should  be the best reward outcome  possible !

e.i. FIX : All the  loot, all the corpses and some bonus  XP for all survived soldiers as form of refund for less shooting. The bonus XP should be at least 2x higher then kill aliens by weapons, because of we fill up the objective.

This way a game designer do not push a player into tedious  search for "a last crab in a closet" TM, but rather give player a bonus for doing the fun stuff = breach the UFO ! THIS should be quite high on priority queue because it improves gameplay on root  level.

Thanks

 

But if the player wipes out the alien crew then the UFO is captured offscreen anyways. So I believe the main objective is to capture the UFO and the secondary objective is to kill all the aliens. I think it's better to reward the player for killing aliens, not for ignoring them in favour of the main objective.  In XCOM UFO defense you could destroy alien bases by blowing up the computers in the command room and then retreating, but that gave you less loot, points and soldier training than defeating all the aliens and capturing the base.

[gG-Unknown]

43 minutes ago, berk said:

So I believe the main objective is to capture the UFO and the secondary objective is to kill all the aliens. I think it's better to reward the player for killing aliens, not for ignoring them in favour of the main objective.

you are right.

Current state is  :

• Main objective  - kill all (which means  player is expected to do  a tedious search over whole map)
• Optional objective - Capture UFO

It gows up organically. I propose switch objective >> make Capture UFO the  main objective and most lucrative way to win  the map.

1 hour ago, fusion-waffle said:

I reckon 999 out of every 1000 Xenonauts 2 players will never be able to tell the difference and distinguish between (i) the current behaviour already in stable milestone 6, (ii) the behaviour Chris proposes (lizards escape with their guns), or (iii) the behaviour you advocate for (more in the player's favour).

You  are on something. Current after battle report is very unfortunate. Player  do not get any information about mission objectives. For example, an abduction mission has very specific goal right ? Unfortuantely, on the current after battle report, you dont get any information about your result.

 

SO ?

After battle report have to  be reworked anyway. Part of the new  mission result  would obviously be "Bonus XP reward for UFO capture" line

That certainly is noticeable.

 

 

Edited January 23 by gG-Unknown

[fusion-waffle]

I meant, if it is left as is, almost no players will ever be as attentive as you and pay enough attention to notice ... so it's probably not worth changing, given limited dev resources & other issues that have a much bigger impact on experience for a larger percentage of players.

Edited January 23 by fusion-waffle

[gG-Unknown]

2 hours ago, fusion-waffle said:

I meant, if it is left as is, almost no players will ever be as attentive as you and pay enough attention to notice ... so it's probably not worth changing, given limited dev resources & other issues that have a much bigger impact on experience for a larger percentage of players.

You are somehow miss the main advantages.

1. Swap main and optional objectives offer player the best mission reward for the most exciting gameplay

2. rework of after battle report falls into "bigger impact" box.  For example, when you save all 10 people from abduction tubes, what is current after mission report say to you ? Where is the satisfaction ? where is reward ?

Got it ?

Edited January 23 by gG-Unknown

[Skitso]

Yeah, debriefing screen that we get after each tactical mission lacks a ton of really important stuff like broken gear and doomsday/panic changes. Both are super important stuff for obvious reasons and I really think it should be a priority fix for Goldhawk.

Overall the game is bafflingly taciturn about changes regarding panic/doomsday values eventhough it's the most important resource in the game. Why is all panic damage hidden from the player? Every anomaly should clearly state the effect it has, all the post mission debriefing screens should state the panic damage, all the resolved air combats should state the panic reduction etc etc. I need to see the numbers: it's pretty important info in a game about preventing panic...

Edited January 24 by Skitso