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Abduction missions plan


Aaron

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I like the stasis pod idea, but wonder if it wouldn't be better to have civilians just follow the aliens passively like they are mind controlled, and teleport out at the end?

As far as earlier mission rewards, I'm wondering if it would be too much work to implement a secondary detection method in the Geoscape, The thinking is there is a "grapevine" of relieved people happy that the Xenonauts came to help them out in their little lonely spot in the world, so they, a small region (likened to an invincible radar circle) would phone you if they saw a UFO.

On the Geoscape the UFO would appear with bare information i.e. direction, and vanish almost immediately.

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Abduction missions are a good idea, and here are a few points.

- They have to be sufficiently different from terror missions. Not just terror missions in different tilesets. Timing them is one way to do it, another is just to make small maps for abductions that you'd complete 3-4 times as fast as a terror mission.

- Stasis pods are a good idea for giving the mission some focus. Alternatively, having to secure some kind of teleporter field the aliens deploy at the far end of the map.

- There could be a few missions where the aliens attack some pre-designed facilities, similar to the Firaxian council escort missions. Aliens attack a research lab, a military base, an airfield, etc.

Rewards should definitely be different from the usual missions.

- Veteran soldiers. These always feel like a good candidate for a special reward. Not Rambo supersoldiers but just someone equivalent to a Corporal maybe and not a Private.

- Weapons. If the game has progressed enough, nations could reward you with some of their stock of laser weapons for instance. For some missions (maybe after you've done several), you could even be rewarded with a Foxtrot/Corsair the nation has built with its own resources.

- Military installations. Small military sites on the Geoscape. Radar sites (much smaller range than of normal bases), SAM sites (capable of doing light damage to UFOs in the immediate vicinity), airfields (places for your aircraft to refuel), although I suspect the engine would not support refueling anywhere except the original base.

For what it's worth, I would absolutely love the occasional escort or rescue mission. The tactics on such missions would be sufficiently different from the usual kill-all-baddies approach to make them a very fun change of pace.

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Abduction missions are a good idea, and here are a few points.

- They have to be sufficiently different from terror missions. Not just terror missions in different tilesets. Timing them is one way to do it, another is just to make small maps for abductions that you'd complete 3-4 times as fast as a terror mission.

- Stasis pods are a good idea for giving the mission some focus. Alternatively, having to secure some kind of teleporter field the aliens deploy at the far end of the map.

- There could be a few missions where the aliens attack some pre-designed facilities, similar to the Firaxian council escort missions. Aliens attack a research lab, a military base, an airfield, etc.

Rewards should definitely be different from the usual missions.

- Veteran soldiers. These always feel like a good candidate for a special reward. Not Rambo supersoldiers but just someone equivalent to a Corporal maybe and not a Private.

- Weapons. If the game has progressed enough, nations could reward you with some of their stock of laser weapons for instance. For some missions (maybe after you've done several), you could even be rewarded with a Foxtrot/Corsair the nation has built with its own resources.

- Military installations. Small military sites on the Geoscape. Radar sites (much smaller range than of normal bases), SAM sites (capable of doing light damage to UFOs in the immediate vicinity), airfields (places for your aircraft to refuel), although I suspect the engine would not support refueling anywhere except the original base.

For what it's worth, I would absolutely love the occasional escort or rescue mission. The tactics on such missions would be sufficiently different from the usual kill-all-baddies approach to make them a very fun change of pace.

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They'd be fluff you'd be rewarded within the form of a item with a longer description or something like that (ex: a old diary of a former Xenonaut containing a small snippet of information or a eyewitness account of the Icelandic incident, etc). No research required, just information for the Hell of it :) .

Where would this item be and how would the player interact with it?

Don't et me wrong I love the idea but it still sounds like pure fluff to me, and I did not manage to sell that idea to Chris. (maybe you got more luck though)

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Regarding rewards: just like Max_Caine said a personel reward would be nice.

For example Yes/No pop-up like this "Thankful for their rescue 2 experienced scientist offer to join your research team for free"

Those people could also help with one research or manufacture and then depart.

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For the rewards, how about this:

We get a nice funding boost (because people not sent to die at the hands of aliens is a good thing for nation morale).

We get the option between three things:

  1. Something (two free scientists or technicians, perhaps)
  2. Something (a free laser rifle or wolf armor if sufficiently progressed in the game, perhaps)
  3. Cash (a decent amount, but not gobs and gobs of it, probably)

This way, even if you don't like the two somethings, you can still get some cash.

So, people like the idea I presented about Rescue Missions (Could be called Abduction Mission, same deal)? Mechanics, and whatnot?

For an indoor style map, like people suggested, we'd just put the teleporter and the stasis pods somewhere inside the building.

Here's another (really basic) mission idea I had:

Aggressive Reconnaissance Mission:

Basic Description: The aliens are attacking a military base or research laboratory to steal human secrets. It's kinda like a rescue/abduction mission, except with terror units, local forces, a longer timer to accommodate the larger area, and a larger, indoors, area. Basically the terror mission of the abduction missions, if you'd like.

I don't know if we'd want to have stasis pods with a teleporter be the "item of interest" again; perhaps it could be a teleporter with computers/research materials as well as stasis pods? The computers and research materials would be of greater value to the nation (precious information vs a single human life. No question as to which is expendable in their eyes). Thus, the computer/research material pods would look different, and give you higher bonuses if you save them, but higher penalties if you destroy them or, even worse, let the aliens make off with them.

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Just as a query about the name of this mission. Would Harvest sound better than Abduction?

Obvious propaganda is Obvious! :P

How about participation in successful abduction missions gets your soldiers a special medal?

How rare/common are these missions supposed to be? I'm still a bit worried about the free personell ideas, etc...

Edited by Gorlom
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Hmmm... all this talk about alien attacks has given me a idea for a mission sub-type which would be a variation on terror missions:

Strategic Sabotage (or something along those lines)

Basic idea: The aliens sent a heavy attack group to assault a ICBM site with the goal of neutralizing the site or even using the missiles to attack a random country within a continent.

Rewards: None directly (you get reputation with the respective country) but if you fail the mission you lose quite a bit of funding from the country hit by the alien controlled nukes.

Objectives:

1a) Neutralize all aliens within the area.

or

1b) Destroy the the base's control room and/or sabotage the silos to prevent the aliens from using the missiles.

Mission failure is if you fail to achieve one of those two objectives.

Doesn't sound like a mission you'd like to do eh? Well Commander, war doesn't always give you shiny gifts for being the guy with his internal organs still mostly intact.

Edited by NoirWolf
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Objectives:

1a) Neutralize all aliens within the area.

1b) Destroy the the base's control room and/or sabotage the silos to prevent the aliens from using the missiles.

Mission failure is if you fail to achieve one of those two objectives.

Is that some awkward phrasing or do you mean that you must complete both objectives for victory? As in you must destroy all the control rooms/silos before killing all lthe aliens? As you would fail to achive the second objective (sabotage) if the mission ends because you completed the first one (killed all the aliens). (It sounds like a mission that could become impossible to win)

If it is awkwardly phrased how would the mission end without you completing one of the objectives? (Aborting the mission excluded from consideration for obvious reasons.)

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Is that some awkward phrasing or do you mean that you must complete both objectives for victory? As in you must destroy all the control rooms/silos before killing all lthe aliens? As you would fail to achive the second objective (sabotage) if the mission ends because you completed the first one (killed all the aliens). (It sounds like a mission that could become impossible to win)

If it is awkwardly phrased how would the mission end without you completing one of the objectives? (Aborting the mission excluded from consideration for obvious reasons.)

It isn't awkwardly phrased, it's 1a and 1b, IE finish one you don't have to do the other (it's a "do A or B" type logic system).

The 1b option is in case you are getting overwhelmed (the mission could be so designed such that 1a is only possible with a veteran team of troops and good tactics while b is the lemming option).

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It isn't awkwardly phrased, it's 1a and 1b, IE finish one you don't have to do the other (it's a "do A or B" type logic system).

I'm sorry but to me "Mission failure is if you fail to achieve one of those two objectives." means that if you do NOT complete both you fail the mission. As achiveing one would mean that you fail to do the other if they end the mission.

I can't get that to be "either or" kind of deal. You would have to have said "mission success is if you achieve one of the objective" for that to be "either or" in my opinion.

Edited by Gorlom
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I'm sorry but to me "Mission failure is if you fail to achieve one of those two objectives." means that if you do NOT complete both you fail the mission. As achiveing one would mean that you fail to do the other if they end the mission.

I can't get that to be "either or" kind of deal. You would have to have said "mission success is if you acheve one of the objective" for that to be "either or" in my opinion.

Mmm now I see where the confusion is from, yeah that's a typo on my part (I was thinking both of the phrase "Mission failure is if you fail to achieve at least one of those objectives." and the one you mentioned, "mission success if you achieve one of the objectives." at the same time so it got jumbled a bit) so the correct form is "Mission failure is if you fail to achieve at least one of those two objectives." , sorry.

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Right.... wait... the first one

"Mission failure is if you fail to achieve at least one of those objectives."
still means that if you don't complete both you fail... :S

Edit: No wait it doesn't... my bad.

Either case my second question: Is it possible to fail to "complete at least one of the objectives" by any other means than having all your soldiers dying or aborting the mission? :)

I'm still wondering a bit about that particular choice of words. I find it a bit odd and get the feelign there is more to it that I'm missing. Why talk about how to fail the mission rather than how to complete it? :P

Edited by Gorlom
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Right.... wait... the first one still means that if you don't complete both you fail... :S

Either case my second question: Is it possible to fail to "complete at least one of the objectives" by any other means than having all your soldiers dying or aborting the mission? :)

I'm still wondering a bit about that particular choice of words. I find it a bit odd and get the feelign there is more to it that I'm missing. Why talk about how to fail the mission rather than how to complete it? :P

Because it's how I view things (glass half empty) and the mission in question would be one where it isn't for fun or for a "treat"-type reward, it's basically just to maintain the status quo a little while longer (thus granting you a better chance to cobble together a defence strategy and place assets to accomplish it) and to save god knows how many thousands or even millions of people from getting nuked. In essence it'd be a mission where the reward is intangible and the atmosphere itself would be dark (your mission objective wouldn't be "Accomplish the mission by doing x" it would be "Mission failure is failing to at least one of two objectives" which in itself gives you a hint that this mission might be one way for whoever went on it).

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Multiple means of victory sound good like either you kill all aliens or destroy say missile silos either gives you a victory but both gives you a bonus.

The Abduction missions could also have kill all aliens or destroy the machinery the the aliens are using for abductions.

Kill all aliens the main objective but for a lesser reward destroy machinery or do both for best reward this way it mixes things up and are not all the same.

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Responding directly to Aaron, not reading entire thread so far:

If the mission is timed, I don't like the aliens "teleporting" away. I'd rather have them run to the edge of the map and leave that way than just poof. (In terms of lore questions, the aliens having a magic escape teleporter is a harder question with bigger implications than "why can't we pursue.")

For rewards: They're gathering information on you, so if you do well you gather information on them. Some UFOs currently in the sky are painted on your minimap, and you'll have some UFOs from the next wave revealed (from picking through alien notes, especially if you captured rather than killed.)

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What might be an interesting alternative here is an anti-escort mission.

You've got a group of aliens trying to traverse the map with a number of (presumably important) captives. You need to kill the aliens without killing the captives to save the day. The aliens come in two "behaviour types" - escorts and soldiers. The escorts might be carrying the captives (perhaps they need to be stunned rather than killed) or simply traveling with them, with the captives on some sort of floating stretcher that stops moving if the controlling escort is killed. The goal of the escorts is simply to get to their "extraction point". Meanwhile, the soldiers travel with them initially but adopt standard battle behaviour upon encountering your troops (attempting to tie them up and buy time for the escorts to escape with the captives).

This would make for an interesting, high-stakes, time-pressured mission with interesting choices - Do I stay and fight the guards, hoping to clean up fast enough to catch up? Do I split my forces? Do I expose my troops to enemy fire by rushing the escorts on initial contact, and hope I suffer minimal losses in the unopposed fire by the guards and can fight them off after the escorts are killed? Do I use heavy weapons and rapid fire to maximize damage output at the risk of killing the captives myself? Do I advance cautiously or rush forward trying to insure I have more time to respond?

I think it's the sort of mission that could really, really break up the the standard approach that exists as-is right now, and make things exciting and new - a change of pace that would really make the mission special.

Since the captives are presumably important, cash for each captive saved is obvious but a variety of rewards obviously present themselves. If you were told who the captives were going in, and they were noticeably different, you'd even get the fun of deciding which captive it is most important to prioritize saving.

Unfortunately, this is more work than the initial proposal - but I'd prefer to not have the initial proposal at all as it stands, since it just plain doesn't seem fun. A time-based bug hunt with minimal important decisions, the need to put my troops at risk for no immediate goal because the alien hiding in the barn is going to magically disappear next turn and it took me a bunch of wasted time to figure out he was in there behind the hay stacks? It just doesn't sound fun.

Edited by GlyphGryph
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What might be an interesting alternative here is an anti-escort mission.

You've got a group of aliens trying to traverse the map with a number of (presumably important) captives. You need to kill the aliens without killing the captives to save the day. The aliens come in two "behaviour types" - escorts and soldiers. The escorts might be carrying the captives (perhaps they need to be stunned rather than killed) or simply traveling with them, with the captives on some sort of floating stretcher that stops moving if the controlling escort is killed. The goal of the escorts is simply to get to their "extraction point". Meanwhile, the soldiers travel with them initially but adopt standard battle behaviour upon encountering your troops (attempting to tie them up and buy time for the escorts to escape with the captives).

This would make for an interesting, high-stakes, time-pressured mission with interesting choices - Do I stay and fight the guards, hoping to clean up fast enough to catch up? Do I split my forces? Do I expose my troops to enemy fire by rushing the escorts on initial contact, and hope I suffer minimal losses in the unopposed fire by the guards and can fight them off after the escorts are killed? Do I use heavy weapons and rapid fire to maximize damage output at the risk of killing the captives myself? Do I advance cautiously or rush forward trying to insure I have more time to respond?

I think it's the sort of mission that could really, really break up the the standard approach that exists as-is right now, and make things exciting and new - a change of pace that would really make the mission special.

Since the captives are presumably important, cash for each captive saved is obvious but a variety of rewards obviously present themselves. If you were told who the captives were going in, and they were noticeably different, you'd even get the fun of deciding which captive it is most important to prioritize saving.

Unfortunately, this is more work than the initial proposal - but I'd prefer to not have the initial proposal at all as it stands, since it just plain doesn't seem fun. A time-based bug hunt with minimal important decisions, the need to put my troops at risk for no immediate goal because the alien hiding in the barn is going to magically disappear next turn and it took me a bunch of wasted time to figure out he was in there behind the hay stacks? It just doesn't sound fun.

Glyph... that sounds like something they might add if they're planning on major things to add prior to release, they're going more for fluff missions they can put together with current assets but if they plan on making any addons or DLCs for the game your mission idea is one that should get put in because it sounds so... I am going to say crunchy (something that as a tactician you can really sink your teeth into as a problem).

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The idea is great and the abduction mission type itself can contain variety like:

1. Abducted people in pods as mentioned in detail earlier (pure awesomeness just thinking on the tiles how cool the would fit in:) - reward or penalty would be determined according to how many pods have been destroyed, teleported or saved when timer expires.

2. Base attack: An HQ of a council member is under attack and must help out local security/soldiers. Recycled Xenonaut base elements. Player has to disable teleport device before pods of high ranking officials is teleported away. Reward is improved funding but what is more important: Wast decrease is the mission is lost (the reward being that this is avoided). Makes sense for the aliens to attack key locations and the text could be localised and give some insight to the lore like: "High ranking military officials of China have assembled in a top secret facility in XY and have come under a surprise attack by Alien strike team. Dispatch a unit immediately to assist local forces"

3. Research facility: Aliens attack a small research facility to delay research of local military. Recycled Xenonauts base elements splattered with blood all over the place to give more terrifying appearance. If won, local forces get new tech and player gets money+more relations benefits that with a normal UFO mission, if lost they stay on the same tech level and player gets relation penalty.

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Well, my suggestion is a bit in-depth, yes, but the nice thing is that it is pretty trivial to "scale down" as it were. The key is just to have two different NPC behaviours and an "extraction point" area of the map where the escape-behaviour NPCs try to get to.

If you want to do a time-limited mission, this is a non-frustrating way to do it, where planning and strategy can play a role, and arguably it wouldn't be terribly difficult. (For certain definitions of terribly difficult) The actual difficulty obviously depends on the engine and infrastructure which... certain signs seem to indicate may not be particularly versatile, so it might not even be possible (esp. to have the extraction point). However, there would be ways to fake this or work around it (a teleporter to an otherwise inaccessible area with many powerful enemies who won't come out and are just waiting with reaction fire, and the match ends when all runner enemy types are dead or within the sealed off room the teleporter goes too. But even that may not be possible - I don't know the code.

If it IS possible, though, there are additional benefits - it could also then be reflavoured in many ways, for example as an "interrupt the convoy" mission or something with the larger UFO drones being the ones with the "escape the map" AI, or a "king of the hill" sort of mode you need to prevent enemies from entering an area where someone is working on some special project or something.

It's a bit more work, but I think the original proposed abduction mission just isn't worth implementing.

(Being able to defend against alien assaults on various human facilities would be fun too, though, but it would be even better with some new AI behaviours, like trying to destroy the human's computing center or something, to actually be much different from the things we've got now.)

Basically, I just want a mission that isn't a bug hunt. What's nice is that regular UFO missions aren't! They can be /played/ as a bug hunt OR as a "secure the objective".

These fluff missions seem strictly inferior, since they would likely play out exactly the same except requiring the player to play them as a bug hunt.

Edited by GlyphGryph
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GlyphGlyph what is the replayability of your mission idea? Don't escort (or in this case reverse escort) become stagnant and repeatetive more quickly then the standard secure UFO/ kill everything missions? Do you think it will live up to beeing played over and over like the standard missions? I usually dislike escort modes and they are usually the least played in various games as far as I understand.

Btw would these alien conga-line missions require special map design (designed with a logistic path that makes sense and possibly chokehold and ambush areas? disregarding the special props needed) or would they be slapped onto whichever map of that tileset (and possibly use androns to demolish a path straight through buildings etc)

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