Salvage team for all UFO types?

[Skitso]

Wouldn't it make sense that the salvage team system that is currently handling all the smaller UFOs that don't generate crash sites would also be used with all the larger UFOs? It's odd that the assault team (often with few dead and/or critically wounded) would stay after the mission to disassemble the UFO, collect all the alien bodies, exotic materials and gear etc. I know this is probably me yelling at clouds, but wouldn't it be much more cohesive, logical, realistic and cool to have the salvage team go and clear the crash site after the assault team leaves? And the bigger the UFO, the longer it would take.

Separating salvage operations from combat missions would also make the delegation process more logical. As the salvage operation completes, you'd get a popup whether to take the loot yourself (cost X op) or donate the loot to the local government. This would make the system more clear for the player and make the crash site mission briefing easier to understand. Currently the delegation OP cost is tied to the victory effect of the mission, which is quite funny.

The salvage mechanics are there already, so I would assume it's not a HUGE undertaking. (Who am I kidding, everything in game developement is... :D) Chris, any thoughts? Worth implementing? 

Edited February 28 by Skitso

[fusion-waffle]

It took me a little while to follow, but by "salvage team", you mean the existing mechanic for how downed UFOs that don't spawn crash site ground combat missions are handled, yeah? Where after N hours a timer expires your nearest base receives a delivery of alenium & alloys (e.g. probes/fighters/bombers)

 

What you're saying makes logical sense from increasing the realism of the alien invasion simulator.  Unsure how it'd be from a gameplay perspective.

 

Couple of thoughts

1. i suspect what many players find jarring about the existing UFO delegation mechanic is that an action that previously required 0 OPs (attempting crash site ground combat mission) suddenly starts costing 100+ OPs.  there's a good game design justification for doing it (reducing the number of repetitive crash site missions in a campaign, & maybe balance-wise making it harder to generate heaps of resources by farming easy UFOs), but many players find the sudden OP cost jarring, at least the first time they experience it.  Would this "always salvage team" proposal change this?

 

2. There'd need to be precise rules about what items the salvage team recovers after a delay, vs what items the strike team recovers. Brainstorming a few obvious options:

• 2(a) baseline, as currently implemented -- strike team recovers everything immediately once dropship returns, salvage team recovers nothing. 
• 2(b) strike team recovers every item that they're holding or that has been thrown onto the dropship floor, same rules as aborting a mission. salvage team recovers everything else after a day or two.  gameplay difference is a 1-2 day delay until player receives most resources (alienium, alloys, UFO components, remaining alien bodies & guns) after a crash site victory.
• 2(c) strike team recovers nothing, salvage team requires everything. gameplay difference is a 1-2 day delay until player receives resources after a crash site victory.

 

Superficially, 2(b) sounds like a reasonable idea. But suppose that was implemented, when players figure out that if they waste 30 minutes of their time at the end of every ground combat mission ordering their soldiers to haul plasma rifles back to the dropship, it means they can get $500k of cash from selling alien plasma rifles to the black market a day or two earlier than if they let the salvage team deal with it, maybe players would start doing that -- and then post complaints that this mechanic isn't fun, they want to be spending their time clearing rooms, not playing alien junk hauling simulator.

 

There's clearly more options than these, but of these three 2(a)-2(b)-2(c) straw man options, I prefer 2(a), leave it as is!

Edited February 28 by fusion-waffle

[Skitso]

3 hours ago, fusion-waffle said:

It took me a little while to follow, but by "salvage team", you mean the existing mechanic for how downed UFOs that don't spawn crash site ground combat missions are handled, yeah? Where after N hours a timer expires your nearest base receives a delivery of alenium & alloys (e.g. probes/fighters/bombers)

 

What you're saying makes logical sense from increasing the realism of the alien invasion simulator.  Unsure how it'd be from a gameplay perspective.

 

Couple of thoughts

1. i suspect what many players find jarring about the existing UFO delegation mechanic is that an action that previously required 0 OPs (attempting crash site ground combat mission) suddenly starts costing 100+ OPs.  there's a good game design justification for doing it (reducing the number of repetitive crash site missions in a campaign, & maybe balance-wise making it harder to generate heaps of resources by farming easy UFOs), but many players find the sudden OP cost jarring, at least the first time they experience it.  Would this "always salvage team" proposal change this?

 

2. There'd need to be precise rules about what items the salvage team recovers after a delay, vs what items the strike team recovers. Brainstorming a few obvious options:

• 2(a) baseline, as currently implemented -- strike team recovers everything immediately once dropship returns, salvage team recovers nothing. 
• 2(b) strike team recovers every item that they're holding or that has been thrown onto the dropship floor, same rules as aborting a mission. salvage team recovers everything else after a day or two.  gameplay difference is a 1-2 day delay until player receives most resources (alienium, alloys, UFO components, remaining alien bodies & guns) after a crash site victory.
• 2(c) strike team recovers nothing, salvage team requires everything. gameplay difference is a 1-2 day delay until player receives resources after a crash site victory.

 

Superficially, 2(b) sounds like a reasonable idea. But suppose that was implemented, when players figure out that if they waste 30 minutes of their time at the end of every ground combat mission ordering their soldiers to haul plasma rifles back to the dropship, it means they can get $500k of cash from selling alien plasma rifles to the black market a day or two earlier than if they let the salvage team deal with it, maybe players would start doing that -- and then post complaints that this mechanic isn't fun, they want to be spending their time clearing rooms, not playing alien junk hauling simulator.

 

There's clearly more options than these, but of these three 2(a)-2(b)-2(c) straw man options, I prefer 2(a), leave it as is!

Thanks for the thoughts and yeah, I can see the issues you pointed. I was thinking this mostly from flavor / realism perspective.

Edited February 28 by Skitso