Some thoughts ...

[Selvhan]

Hello guys !

1st of all I would like to say that Xenonauts look really promising ! The more I play, the more I enjoy this game.

Here are some thoughts ...

- Laser on the guns to add a little aim.

- Flash light on the gun.

- Enhanced clip ( more bullet, different type of bullet...)

- Customization for the armour, like helm, arms, shoulders, legs, patch/colour/camo... ( more plating, lighter plating, flash light, night vision... )

- Additional plating for vehicle. Additional equipment... ( Spot Light, smoke, transport troops then they can assault... )

- Mounted gun/turret. ( Maybe on the chopper )

- More vehicle.

In the X-com series, the vehicle ( at least for me ) as always been used for scouting because they do not get experience, they take more space in the Skyranger/chopper..

I would like to see a crew in the vehicle getting experience and then being more efficient with the vehicle. Also, the chopper could transport the vehicle using chain, and you could drop it just before landing.

When your pilot from interceptor crash, they never survive. Maybe a new type of mission could be to recover the pilot.

In this game, the local forces are using better weapon as you research them, that's what I like.

Civilian should try to go around the Xenonauts chopper to get cover.

Money as always been used to fund the Xenonauts/Xcom organisation. What about getting stuff ( maybe random ) depending on how well you defend a country ? They could provide you certain type of stuff depending on your rating. I'm not saying to remove money, but to add a little more to the rating value.

Well, what do you guys think about that ?

[thothkins]

Hi Selvhan!

Some thoughts on your thoughts, if that makes sense. It's late here

- Laser on the guns to add a little aim.

The weapons are supposed to fall into distinct categories. Now, you could add accuracy on all of them by having lots of laser scopes. But that will affect balance against the enemy troops. So, they would have to have laser scopes and suddenly you're playing Xeno-Snipers. Not that you'd be playing it with sniper rifles as the accuracy of the other weapons has increased enough to make them redundant. General accuracy is part of the balancing that's going on, and it should always be remembered that your troops do get better as the game goes on trhough stat increases.

- Flash light on the gun.

The most recent thread covering this sort of thing is on Night Goggles. Not quite flashlights on guns, but hey, if it's not there you can always add your thoughts on it, if you haven't already.

- Enhanced clip ( more bullet, different type of bullet...) Another very topical point again. Currently being looked at in this thread by GizmoGomez

- Customization for the armour, like helm, arms, shoulders, legs, patch/colour/camo... ( more plating, lighter plating, flash light, night vision... ) This one's more a limitation of the game, in that it takes a fair amount of resource to change everything the way it's set up. However, see here for a look at a very interesting Marine Mod in progress from cspruce.

- Additional plating for vehicle. Additional equipment... ( Spot Light, smoke, transport troops then they can assault... )

Extra vehicle protection will be looked at as game balancing goes on. My understanding is that they used to be a bit tougher, but these things come and go a little until a happy balance is struck. Likewise the sight of the vehicle used to make it very handy for scouting. As for transporting soldiers, I would love nothing more than seeing an APC come out of a dropship and race across the map . However, it renders the map itself just scenery and gets away from the tension of having to explore it, facing aliens on the way. Besides, what if the aliens get some as balance. Actually, now I'm seeing larger maps with APCs and Alien Transporter Drones

- Mounted gun/turret. ( Maybe on the chopper )

This one comes up a fair bit, probably not helped by that Chinook picture with it in there It would take away from some of the tension if the aliens trying to pin down your troops were just wiped out by the .50 cal machine gun . It would possibly ruin your enjoyment to see your troops wiped out by the alien equivalent as you approached their ship every mission.

- More vehicle.

What sort of things would you like to see?

In the X-com series, the vehicle ( at least for me ) as always been used for scouting because they do not get experience, they take more space in the Skyranger/chopper..

Yeah, although their scouting is in conjunction with soaking up some enemy fire for me. Tanks don't last long even when I do use them.

I would like to see a crew in the vehicle getting experience and then being more efficient with the vehicle. Also, the chopper could transport the vehicle using chain, and you could drop it just before landing.

The tank experience didn't make it past Kickstarter. Good point about the Chinook's airlift capacity (although sometimes it is travellign round the world in the game's current balance ) There was a good recent thread about modularity for the dropship by GizmoGomez...here it is. You could add this onto there.

When your pilot from interceptor crash, they never survive. Maybe a new type of mission could be to recover the pilot.

The aircraft now survives in the latest experimental build. I've not encountered it yet to see if the pilot also does. I imagine it's not much of a step to have them picked up if everything else makes it for repair.

In this game, the local forces are using better weapon as you research them, that's what I like.

Yeah, it's a nice touch. I wish I knew about it before one of the locals lasered my Xenonaut in the back though. Grrrr.

Civilian should try to go around the Xenonauts chopper to get cover.

Civilians are (slightly) smarter, and some do make their way in there. Having very smart civilians just wouldn't be X-Com though would it?

Money as always been used to fund the Xenonauts/Xcom organisation. What about getting stuff ( maybe random ) depending on how well you defend a country ? They could provide you certain type of stuff depending on your rating. I'm not saying to remove money, but to add a little more to the rating value.

Mr Scrooge now hires the Xenonaut bean counters to do his accounts. That's how stingy the Xenonaut economy is at present. Additions would have to be very well balanced and not exploitable. Bearing in mind that beyond cash the funding nations are behind technologically everywhere else, what kind of stuff had you in mind? I do think that funding in the Xenonuat setting is a little odd. More so as auto updates etc are in place and where stores has become nearly redundant.

[Selvhan]

Thanks for the reply

Country could provide you armoured vehicles ( 1st tier ) you can then equip them as you like. They could provide you, rarely, a Condor if you lost one. They could gives you a promising soldier. They could grant you the command of their troop on the ground ( Local forces ). How could this work ? Your rating could be also a money use to "buy" stuff from the different country depending on your local rating. This could also be use to improve the local forces with lower tier vehicle. ( We're just talking here )

More vehicles ? Well anything from a fast scouting jeep to a tank.

Also, exploring the map is something you might want to do before transporting your troops. If you trigger too many alien reaction, you will most likely lose the vehicle and a lot of wounded/dead troops.

Customizing your basic weapon won't break the game balance. You could simply have to produce it. In the beginning of the game your technicians are pretty idle. Laser weapon are already very precise and already simply have the laser scope. My goal is too make the 1st tier weapon more useful as I like them a lot

What I had in mind with the chinhook was to be used once landed. That would help you create a safer small perimeter once you landed. If you approach a landed ufo... they could lift up anytime or fire at you... but to prevent that, you could send a ship to escort your chinhook. For the crash, well you don't need to worry too much.

[thothkins]

Country could provide you armoured vehicles ( 1st tier ) you can then equip them as you like. They could provide you, rarely, a Condor if you lost one.

We're just talking about aircraft costs and whether there should be any over here. An extension of that is, as you point out, vehicles too.

They could gives you a promising soldier.

The soldiers you recruit form the hiring pool are supposed to represent the best of the best they have.

They could grant you the command of their troop on the ground ( Local forces ). How could this work ?

This comes up along with taking command of civilians too. Having local troops at all, was one of the Xenonaut plus points that was advertised. I think taking control of them fell out with the game's scope. No doubt someone will come up with a mind controlling Megaphone mod at some point. Further reading on this can be found here and also here

Your rating could be also a money use to "buy" stuff from the different country depending on your local rating. This could also be use to improve the local forces with lower tier vehicle. ( We're just talking here )

Hope you don't mind me splitting your point like that. But with manufacturing and stores looking increasingly hollow I'm thinking along lines that this sort of thing has mileage. It is more complex though, taking it out of the game's scope.

More vehicles ? Well anything from a fast scouting jeep to a tank.

There was a proper tank in the early art for the game, but didn't really come to anything. It goes back into what I was saying about use of support weapons taking away form the focus being on the soldiers, not to mention alien balancing.

Also, exploring the map is something you might want to do before transporting your troops. If you trigger too many alien reaction, you will most likely lose the vehicle and a lot of wounded/dead troops.

That pretty much sums up every Ferret I've used in this game scout. attract fire. Boom!

Customizing your basic weapon won't break the game balance. You could simply have to produce it. In the beginning of the game your technicians are pretty idle. Laser weapon are already very precise and already simply have the laser scope. My goal is too make the 1st tier weapon more useful as I like them a lot

You should add thought into GizmoGomez's thread (link above). Just the sort of thing being discussed there. I agree, the workshops are very idle in Xenonauts for a few reasons.

What I had in mind with the chinhook was to be used once landed. That would help you create a safer small perimeter once you landed. If you approach a landed ufo... they could lift up anytime or fire at you... but to prevent that, you could send a ship to escort your chinook. For the crash, well you don't need to worry too much.

I've not looked too closely, but either spawn points are kept a conservative distance away from the landing craft (so as to avoid clashing), or in previous X-Com games, there is some sort of perimeter setting on more random maps.

In other words, all the aliens aren't waiting for you to open the landing craft doors. So, the effect you're looking for may be in effect. (you just don;t get to see them strafing the ground in hi definition as this is an indy game with a smaller budget

[200down]

Agree with most if not all of the suggestions but I think it may be too much to ask atm. Maybe for the next xenonauts if there is one They have their hands full already if you haven't noticed. Still soo many bugs to fix before thinking about adding new content.

Although, an easy way to mod your own "scout" hunter and still keep the balance is simply to raise the AP's up to at least 60 but not the site range. Site range is where things will start to get unbalanced in a big hurry. The hunter isn't meant to absorb tons of damage or be a tank. So having hit points at 250ish and AP's at 60 is a good start. Hit points do need to be at least that high though, simply because the hunter is a 2 by 3 tile beast that aliens will NEVER miss. Ether that or you could raise energy resists a tad and have hit points lower if that's more to your liking.

Currently the gap between the hunter and the next vehicle is so long that it's hard to balance. It feels overpowered at game start and way too underpowered to bother using a bit later on. They need some other vehicle to fill that gap. Or some research changes.