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Turning and moving


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In the OG, I recall that, if you were to move in a different direction than the one you were facing, you were not charged with additional AP for the direction change. This seemed natural, since the turning was part of the move. That led to interesting situations, because you had to decide if it would be better to be cautious and first turn, then move, or just start moving, even though you were not able to see what is there at that direction, in order to avoid the extra AP cost for turning. That was true for changing direction while moving, as well.

I think most people would agree that turning as part of moving does not really take more time than just moving. I would like to see that implemented in the game. Or, at least, reduced cost for turning while moving.

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In the OG, I recall that, if you were to move in a different direction than the one you were facing, you were not charged with additional AP for the direction change. This seemed natural, since the turning was part of the move. That led to interesting situations, because you had to decide if it would be better to be cautious and first turn, then move, or just start moving, even though you were not able to see what is there at that direction, in order to avoid the extra AP cost for turning. That was true for changing direction while moving, as well.
...But turning did cost AP in the original. ;P

As you can see' date=' I state clearly that turning cost AP but [b']not when moving[/b] ;)

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I think that what is presented here is better than in original game. Looking back at realism, in order to start heading back what you do first is turn, you don't start going back and turn in the process, because you don't know what is behind you. In the game if you have an overview you are aware of terrain around a soldier which in movement is like cheating.

Original x-com for me was neglecting the fact that if you break down the movement you have turning as a part of move. So I would opt for leaving it as it is right now. I do not mind loosing extra points for turning and it does feel more natural.

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I agree, it'd be somewhat of a bother to change it now, and I like how it makes more sense in this game. I mean, sure, you gain a couple, maybe four max TUs when you start moving without planning, encouraging reckless behavior, but is that really necessary?

Good catch, though, I've never realized that before.

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I mean, sure, you gain a couple, maybe four max TUs when you start moving without planning, encouraging reckless behavior, but is that really necessary?

It is not max 4, because your movement may contain direction changes as well. For example, you start walking to your left(2 TUs) you walk 2 squares straight and then diagonal 1 square(+1 TU) then straight one square(+1 TU) then you make it to the right to seek cover (+2 TUs). This is a simple scenario, and you already lost 6 TUs. I had movement that cost my soldier as many as 14 TUs in direction changes, while moving. In addition, if you want to shoot at an opponent who is 45 degrees in your line of sight, your soldier turns at the cost of 1 TU in order to shoot, automatically. The combination of TU loses for direction changes is quite significant.

One other thing is that, in the OG, while you were moving you would not spot anything. You spotted things as soon as you stopped moving. It made sense, because the 1 TU spent for turning is not for the movement, but for the spotting. Turning is very easy and you do not, really, need a whole TU to turn, you need the 1 TU to spot at the direction of your turning.

In Xenonauts, so far, the spotting ability seems unaffected by movement. This reduces the attention level needed to move your troops around, since you are confident your soldier will stop the movement automatically if he spots an Alien. This reduces the effects from surprise reaction fire from Aliens, that you would have been able to see if you moved slower.

Well, I liked that aspect of the OG. I would like Xenonauts to keep this if possible. It makes you feel more responsible for the lives of your troops. Many a time I had lost a soldier because I was moving him too fast in the battlefield. I was cursing myself for my stupidity and carelessness, when I felt too confident that I had an easy mission, only to find out that being cocky does not pay.

I really think it would add to the game if it kept that. The free turning when moving and the lack of spotting when moving are tied and produce a great gameplay, IMHO.

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The biggest question is - why are you forcing the game to be an exact copy of an old x-com?

By not allowing for the game to have it's own style and accepting it as it is, you limit the possibility for the game to give you something more that the original.

For me the movement should stay as is, but you might as well consider a poll for the rest of community to share their thoughts. This type of movement is more military - look where you go and your gun moves where your eyes move. Soldier tries to spot enemy as soon as possible

...

unless you wish for the player to be turned from micro-manager into nano-manager, developers could easily remove any path-finding and force users to move characters tile by tile and spending time on turning/spotting. That would give you exactly what you want with blindly going in some direction and allow other to still spot for potential enemies.

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The biggest question is - why are you forcing the game to be an exact copy of an old x-com?

By not allowing for the game to have it's own style and accepting it as it is, you limit the possibility for the game to give you something more that the original.

The game is based on the old x-com. I cannot see why you would suggest I am forcing the game to be "an exact copy" by just pointing out something that gave the original game another dimension in tactical combat that have never since been included in any other game, no matter if it was based on X-COM or not. Xenonauts has its own style and, for the first time since X-COM, I see a game that has the potential or being even better. My suggestions will, hopefully, help the developers to get aware of things they might had missed, evaluate their significance and make the decision if they will include it or not.

For me the movement should stay as is, but you might as well consider a poll for the rest of community to share their thoughts. This type of movement is more military - look where you go and your gun moves where your eyes move. Soldier tries to spot enemy as soon as possible...

Trully? Moving at max speed(spending most TUs) means running. You run to get to cover, you run to retreat or you can dash to get to the heat of battle or to support your comrades. I am absolutely certain that, when you are running, you hardly spot anything around you.

unless you wish for the player to be turned from micro-manager into nano-manager, developers could easily remove any path-finding and force users to move characters tile by tile and spending time on turning/spotting. That would give you exactly what you want with blindly going in some direction and allow other to still spot for potential enemies.

Funny you would say something like that, unless you have never played the original. In addition, how come you having more TUs for movement is bad? Moving through an already explored area should take less time for the player than exploring/scouting the area with the forward soldiers. This was the case with the original. I would love if it was added to this game.

At any case, I give my two cents, just like everybody else in this forum. I like the game and I would like it to be the best strategy game ever(taking the place of X-COM1994 that was voted the best strategy game ever, mostly because of what you call "nano-management").

Last, but not least, I neither have the power nor the desire to "force" anything on the developers. I am sure they want their game to be the best possible and they are doing their best within their power to accomplish that.

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Turning should burn TUs. I think the movement system works fine. IMO, think there are much bigger fish to fry than worrying about stuff like that, details in background art of the screens, etc... I'd much prefer GoldHawk to finish the content, balance, get the mechanics done and debug before they start worrying about those type of issues.

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Turning should burn TUs. I think the movement system works fine. IMO, think there are much bigger fish to fry than worrying about stuff like that, details in background art of the screens, etc... I'd much prefer GoldHawk to finish the content, balance, get the mechanics done and debug before they start worrying about those type of issues.

Art screens and tactical combat mechanics like the TU spending specifics and whether you spot while you move are hardly on the same line. And the details on the tactical combat mechanics can make the difference to a game. From outstanding to good and vice-versa, IMHO.

Edited by ThunderGr
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I don't believe that at all. You adapt to the system just fine. The aliens have turning costs too. It's not like this hampers playing the game. It does slow you down to go a different direction. The laws of physics are immutable on that one. The game is not meant to be as detailed as some are because the scope is much larger than just a tactical ground simulator (which it's not.) We could be another five years in the development if that were the case.

Edited by StellarRat
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The original X-COM(and TFTD) had it. I liked it.

It is not so hard to implement, in fact, it is ridiculously easy to do so. Just a check if the soldier is moving to another square before you deduce TUs for turning. And only call the spotting function when the soldier stops moving. No need for "another five years in development".

The only thing needed to implement it is the desire to do so by the developers. Implementation time is trivial.

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I was considering movement in a tactical manner, where soldier is walking slower and more cautious, since that is a battlefield. Even if we know that the map is square and there is no way for new enemies to show up, that is still a war zone, where one has to be ready all the time. But if you on the other hand consider movement as a run, then most likely it should work as you say. So that soldier doesn't "see" where he's going and things just flash around him.

Then again you might run into another set of problems. Solder that does not move should have steadier hand and better aim than the one, which moved. Also when being fired you most likely would have to take into account how much has he traveled in particular turn (moving targets are harder to hit). To be fair path finding should take that into account and not allow for navigating around obstacles (the ones that are still undetected) and have soldier smack into it (think Blinkin in Men in tights) - possibly injuring himself, loosing ground, etc. That said there is one more thing to consider - map level. If there were stairs on the way it would be only fair if the person would run to the next floor or hit the floor because he wasn't expecting else than a flat ground?

All of these would make an interesting gameplay, but the problem is that they would additionally require a lot of work. Unless of course you propose cheating like with x-com where by "trying" different paths you could "see" the terrain around you (pretty sure it worked like that).

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I was considering movement in a tactical manner, where soldier is walking slower and more cautious, since that is a battlefield. Even if we know that the map is square and there is no way for new enemies to show up, that is still a war zone, where one has to be ready all the time. But if you on the other hand consider movement as a run, then most likely it should work as you say. So that soldier doesn't "see" where he's going and things just flash around him.

Then again you might run into another set of problems. Solder that does not move should have steadier hand and better aim than the one, which moved. Also when being fired you most likely would have to take into account how much has he traveled in particular turn (moving targets are harder to hit). To be fair path finding should take that into account and not allow for navigating around obstacles (the ones that are still undetected) and have soldier smack into it (think Blinkin in Men in tights) - possibly injuring himself, loosing ground, etc. That said there is one more thing to consider - map level. If there were stairs on the way it would be only fair if the person would run to the next floor or hit the floor because he wasn't expecting else than a flat ground?

To create a movement system using the most realistic parameters is complex and time consuming. I think something like that is outside the scope of this game.

However, the OG had worked around that by putting the weight of the responsibility to the player. So, if the player selected a lengthy movement path, the soldier was considered running through the area, not spotting anything else until he was shot at, bumped on an obstacle or finished the movement. The most cautious movement was to move square by square. The TU spending was the same but the developers counted on the psychology of the human nature. The most careful commanders would move cautiously the scouts, at most a couple of squares at a time, in order to avoid any ambushes and the other troops more relaxed. Rushing your soldier around a corner was, often, lethal, since he would not spot anything until he stopped and aliens were lurking in the shadows. Other times, you would rush through explored territory to cover flanked soldiers under attack, only to have the soldier fall victim to a hidden alien, behind your lines.

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That's the thing - I don't recall bumping into an obstacle in any x-com game. But I do recall "scouting" the terrain by mouse cursor or path-finding to know what is where. At least to a degree, since it was time consuming and most of the time I was a cautious commander anyways and haven't sent ppl to the middle of room to find them surrounded by enemies.

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That's the thing - I don't recall bumping into an obstacle in any x-com game. But I do recall "scouting" the terrain by mouse cursor or path-finding to know what is where. At least to a degree, since it was time consuming and most of the time I was a cautious commander anyways and haven't sent ppl to the middle of room to find them surrounded by enemies.

Hmmm, perhaps I was one of the few that liked this feature. I would certainly wish for a realistic battlefield movement with difference between running, walking, crouching and crawling across the terrain in TUs, spotting and accuracy but I doubt it will be done. I hoped that, maybe, adding something like what the OG did would give the illusion of such a distinction, at the most minimal level, anyway.

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I don't have a problem with different types of movement ... and frankly loved them in Silent Storm, Silent Storm Sentinels and Hammer & Sickle, not to mention the degree of terrain destructibility.

But now that I think of it Apocalypse had definitely a running for movement and crawling (not sure if only a stance or movement as well).

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But now that I think of it Apocalypse had definitely a running for movement and crawling (not sure if only a stance or movement as well).

It was stance and movement. Apocalypse had some strong points, like the movement, but had dropped out many of the features that had made X-COM such a great game.

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....The most cautious movement was to move square by square. The TU spending was the same but the developers counted on the psychology of the human nature. The most careful commanders would move cautiously the scouts, at most a couple of squares at a time, in order to avoid any ambushes and the other troops more relaxed. Rushing your soldier around a corner was, often, lethal, since he would not spot anything until he stopped and aliens were lurking in the shadows. Other times, you would rush through explored territory to cover flanked soldiers under attack, only to have the soldier fall victim to a hidden alien, behind your lines.
I'm a bit confused then, because in Xeno it works the same way the only difference is that it stops your soldier for you if you spot something. Did I miss something?
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I'm a bit confused then, because in Xeno it works the same way the only difference is that it stops your soldier for you if you spot something. Did I miss something?

The soldier spots as he is moving, so, there is no chance for him to walk into an ambush. And there is the extra TUs spending when turning while moving that did not exist in the OG. These are the 2 differences.

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