Aynert Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 I was playing earlier today and I ended up painting myself into a corner of sorts when a terror mission popped up. I took my dropship there and completed it without any major problems, but straight away after finishing it and returning to the geoscape I ran into an issue that didn't feel like it was my fault and also felt like something I couldn't have done anything to prevent. A couple of seconds later a UFO appears right next to my dropship and it is instantly shot down. Reloading and trying to fly in a different direction couldn't do anything to change the outcome. No matter what my dropship would be instantly downed and I'd lose half my troops without any chance of escape or being able to fight back. The only way it feels like I could have prevented being stuck like this would be to have an escort of interceptors lead my dropship to the terror site to deal with any UFOs trying to shoot it down; however it wasn't possible for me to do this as all I had available at that point in the game were Condors, which didn't have enough range to reach the terror site before having to return to base to refuel. What made me feel somewhat cheated by this is the fact that realistically a situation like this would be very possible to avoid. Simply land the dropship somewhere in the area and engage the hostiles on the ground. It doesn't sound very hard to impliment; simply give us the option to land the dropship and make any pursuing UFOs trigger a ground battle instead of just shooting it down outright. Also I wouldn't say it makes things much easier. It just gives players a way to fight their way out of an otherwise unwinnable situation. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Falidell Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 Simply land the dropship somewhere in the area and engage the hostiles on the ground. It doesn't sound very hard to impliment; simply give us the option to land the dropship and make any pursuing UFOs trigger a ground battle instead of just shooting it down outright. Also I wouldn't say it makes things much easier. It just gives players a way to fight their way out of an otherwise unwinnable situation. Realism aside(being UFO would just shoot the grounded dropship from above) i rather like the idea of engaging in a ground battle instead of fighting... of course this wouldn't be able to happen with Fighters because well they're fighters but with scouts and the like i think this would be a fun gameplay element... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoirWolf Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 Realism aside(being UFO would just shoot the grounded dropship from above) i rather like the idea of engaging in a ground battle instead of fighting... of course this wouldn't be able to happen with Fighters because well they're fighters but with scouts and the like i think this would be a fun gameplay element... Fighters would just strafe your guys on the ground to death. Does the game not have a escort option for your troop transport? If yes reload at a earlier point and send the skyranger with an escort fighter or two, the option to land would then require additional things to be scripted in to not just make it a "get out of shit free" card. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elydo Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 Even the Chinook has far more range/fuel capacity than any escort, so you can't just put some fighters in a squadron with the transport and send them off to a mission. Even worse, trying I would expect to force you to RTB the whole squadron when the fighters ran low on fuel as there's no mechanic for splitting individual craft from a squadron in flight. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoirWolf Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 Even the Chinook has far more range/fuel capacity than any escort, so you can't just put some fighters in a squadron with the transport and send them off to a mission. Even worse, trying I would expect to force you to RTB the whole squadron when the fighters ran low on fuel as there's no mechanic for splitting individual craft from a squadron in flight. Then be careful how you allocate troops and resources? I know that may seem harsh but... if one city has to vanish into the gullet of a alien bug so the world doesn't get raped by greys that's a small price to pay. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elydo Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 Well, if it becomes a choice of "Send the transport out unescorted to that terror mission halfway around the globe and hope it doesn't get shot down" or "don't do the terror site" on the occasions that the transport does get shot down you get screwed either way, doubly so if it happens while going TO the mission rather than having completed it. So each and every mission has a low risk of auto-loss, with a lower risk of auto-loss with extra punishment. In either case it could cripple a game. During a ground mission gone wrong there is always the option to retreat, and even if you don't manage you get the transport back and can once again go on missions when the new rooks arrive at the longest. For this, you not only lose the men, but have to wait... how long? Days I would assume, for the transport to be recovered. And there's no way to avoid it. Not even going to the mission start autosave and taking the correct approach to dealing with a lobsterman terror mission. Ultimately, if we require transports to be escorted we're coming back to the continental transport argument. We never did resolve that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoirWolf Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 Well, if it becomes a choice of "Send the transport out unescorted to that terror mission halfway around the globe and hope it doesn't get shot down" or "don't do the terror site" on the occasions that the transport does get shot down you get screwed either way, doubly so if it happens while going TO the mission rather than having completed it. So each and every mission has a low risk of auto-loss, with a lower risk of auto-loss with extra punishment. In either case it could cripple a game. During a ground mission gone wrong there is always the option to retreat, and even if you don't manage you get the transport back and can once again go on missions when the new rooks arrive at the longest. For this, you not only lose the men, but have to wait... how long? Days I would assume, for the transport to be recovered. And there's no way to avoid it. Not even going to the mission start autosave and taking the correct approach to dealing with a lobsterman terror mission.Ultimately, if we require transports to be escorted we're coming back to the continental transport argument. We never did resolve that. This could be fixed somewhat by delaying the timing of the aggressive UFOs which hunt down transports, this way you could in theory at least have two bases and cover somewhat the transport between the two of them. Also realism FTW! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StellarRat Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 When the aliens start deploying fighters I start sending escort Condors with the dropship. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gorlom Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 When the aliens start deploying fighters I start sending escort Condors with the dropship. OP already said that the terror site was out of range from his fighter planes. Is he behind on research or base expansion or whatever? or are these situations more likely to happen than one could consider to be fair?It sounds a bit like the wrong kind of difficulty (the difficulty that arise from bad controlschemes rather than design) from the OPs description. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amaror Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 (edited) I like that option, although it doesn't have to be a ground battle, just make it no exploitable. For example you can say that you transporter will land and hide in a forest or something, were ufos will not be able to find it. Then the ufos will simply not be able to attack the transporter as long as the transporter hides. This would be much easier to implement, i guess at least, and it would explain why the ufo doesn't just bomb the transporter to dust. To balance the whole thing and hinder players of being able to slowly creep towards a goal by constantly landing/unlanding when the ufo comes around you can just say that you can only do it once per flight. Or landing/unlanding just takes a pretty long time, like a few howers. You could explain the limit of hiding options by saying that it takes a set of special small engines to savely land the transporter somewhere were an ufo can't find them. ... Thinking about it you can even make it an research option unlocked at light scouts by, say, studying the propulsion system of the ufo. Just to mention it, i had the exact same problem coming from a terror mission. Their hard enough as it is, they shouldn't be THAT dangerous. Edited September 25, 2013 by Amaror Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gorlom Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 Being able to land the transport doesnt really solve the problem if the transport is over water. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoirWolf Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 Being able to land the transport doesnt really solve the problem if the transport is over water. In case of a water landing you may be used as a flotation device. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StellarRat Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 OP already said that the terror site was out of range from his fighter planes. Is he behind on research or base expansion or whatever? or are these situations more likely to happen than one could consider to be fair?It sounds a bit like the wrong kind of difficulty (the difficulty that arise from bad controlschemes rather than design) from the OPs description. Yeah, that's a problem. I don't think I've had that happen yet, but it certainly could happen. Interesting problem. I don't know if I have a good answer for that besides seeing if GH can do something. Rather than landing the dropship maybe they can make sure the air is clear of fighters if a dropship is responding to a terror site? Maybe they can get an escort by national forces when responding to terror sites. I dont' know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aynert Posted September 26, 2013 Author Share Posted September 26, 2013 Yeah, that's a problem. I don't think I've had that happen yet, but it certainly could happen. Interesting problem. I don't know if I have a good answer for that besides seeing if GH can do something. Rather than landing the dropship maybe they can make sure the air is clear of fighters if a dropship is responding to a terror site? Maybe they can get an escort by national forces when responding to terror sites. I dont' know. I think the issue with it is that it is such a rare occurrence that it just feels like incredibly bad luck when it happens. If it happened semi-regularly then it would feel like something that you would need to prepare for, as in always have an escort with your dropships when moving to landing zones and terror sites, but since it probably happens less than 1% of the time going through the trouble of arranging an escort and ensuring that you have a proper base setup to keep your interceptors in range just feels like a waste of time and resources. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max_Caine Posted September 26, 2013 Share Posted September 26, 2013 The percentage chance of a solider being healthy/injured/dead on the destruction of a dropship can be jiggered with in config.xml, and there are separate values for a dropship taken out on friendly territory, neutral territory (i.e. water) and unfriendly territory. Would it be useful to have the percentages changed so over friendly/neutral territory there's a 0% chance of a solider dying, and make it something like 50/50 healthy/injured if over water, and 75/25 healthy/injured over friendly? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoirWolf Posted September 26, 2013 Share Posted September 26, 2013 The percentage chance of a solider being healthy/injured/dead on the destruction of a dropship can be jiggered with in config.xml, and there are separate values for a dropship taken out on friendly territory, neutral territory (i.e. water) and unfriendly territory. Would it be useful to have the percentages changed so over friendly/neutral territory there's a 0% chance of a solider dying, and make it something like 50/50 healthy/injured if over water, and 75/25 healthy/injured over friendly? Random soldier 1: I hear you survived getting stranded over the North Sea! Hero soldier 1: Fuck kid... I wish I was over it... spent 3 weeks in ice cold water! Direct version: Over water it should be a 50/50 chance injured or dead and over friendly it should be 50/50 injured or healthy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amaror Posted September 26, 2013 Share Posted September 26, 2013 I think the issue with it is that it is such a rare occurrence that it just feels like incredibly bad luck when it happens. If it happened semi-regularly then it would feel like something that you would need to prepare for, as in always have an escort with your dropships when moving to landing zones and terror sites, but since it probably happens less than 1% of the time going through the trouble of arranging an escort and ensuring that you have a proper base setup to keep your interceptors in range just feels like a waste of time and resources. Yeah it does feel like incredibly bad luck, but loosing your elite soldiers because of bad luck is not fun, it feels like the game is being unfair. Problem is: Even if you have many bases, so that you can sent interceptors against fighters, fighters are so fast that there's no way your interceptors will get to them in time if your dropship is allready in the air when they spawn. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hovis Posted September 26, 2013 Share Posted September 26, 2013 There should definitely be a safe way to ditch a troop transport and save the passengers and crew in the event of attack by fighters. Land the thing, troops bail out, and they run like hell. If the transport is destroyed, fair enough, and maybe it takes 48 hours to get the soldiers back, but there's no rationale for going down with the ship like they do. Yes, it makes life easier, but that is the benefit of the home field advantage in air warfare, it's a perfectly reasonable and realistic thing to have. It's pretty reckless to not have a plan like this in place really. I'd just put in a big button with 'DITCH' on it for transports. If activated you lose the transport and any vehicles on board, and your guys show up at home 48 hours later, maybe 72 hours if they are over water when they ditch. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeV37 Posted September 28, 2013 Share Posted September 28, 2013 Actually, why do we think that UFO's would strafe our guys to death? The precedent is in fact the opposite. I've had a corvette land, and my planes with all the best ordnance I could get them had to twiddle their thumbs and run out of fuel. Then the bastard got up and flew away. (Granted, he wasn't actively trying to avoid me, but that's how it worked out.) Why can't I do the same? Consequences are already there: you have to sit a whole chopper of guys out for a wave as the interceptor patrols the skies above you, and if there's a terror site you might not have the luxury. An option to land the dropship would be great. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonathanYu Posted October 2, 2013 Share Posted October 2, 2013 Why not just disable the ability of UFOs attacking Chinooks altogether? The UFOs usually fly really high up so it's conceivable that they may not spot/bother about low-flying unarmed Chinooks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GlyphGryph Posted October 2, 2013 Share Posted October 2, 2013 The ability to split up and reform squadrons in-flight would really be required to make the concept of escorts effective - as is, there is NO way to escort a Chinook to most Terror Sites until rather late in the tech tree, and the punishment for responding is quite severe - and it's mostly a side effect of the interface, since it should be possible to have the condors escort the chinook out as far as they can, and then have the chinook go on alone for at least partial protection, and it would be even better if they could then meet up with interceptors from the base near the terror site who would escort it in the rest of the way. Of course, getting them back would take some effort, since they wouldn't be able to stop in the local base to wait for the escorts to refuel... Man the whole thing is just sort of frustrating, logistically. At this point I'm honestly going to support the "UFOs don't attack chinooks" thing too, since there's no good way to deal with it and completely random screws you can't do anything about aren't really a great ida. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
victorix58 Posted October 2, 2013 Share Posted October 2, 2013 I agree with you about adding the ability to split up flying groups - thats a useful and rational feature. Maybe there could just be more options on how to protect the chinook. For instance, adding alien tech which reduces the likelihood that someone will be shot down -- perhaps making the later dropships invulnerable/stealth for some lore-based reason? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EisenKreutzer Posted October 3, 2013 Share Posted October 3, 2013 (edited) I had this happen to me once. I managed to save scum until I only lost two soldiers, an acceptable loss. Sending fighters to escort your dropship is a must later in the game, so make sure you have fiter coverage of the majority of the world. Edited October 3, 2013 by EisenKreutzer Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kenmtraveller Posted October 4, 2013 Share Posted October 4, 2013 How about this: When your chinook is intercepted, it gets shot down but your soldiers are CAPTURED, a small alien base is generated, and you have to go rescue them? That changes an always-reload situation into one that both more interesting and possible to recover from. Maybe there is a timer where they experiment on your soldiers, one per week, and some of them may come back 'different'. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anon_Spartan Posted October 7, 2013 Share Posted October 7, 2013 I would love a Blackhawk down situation to break up usual gameplay. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.