Solver Posted January 6, 2014 Share Posted January 6, 2014 So one thing that bugs me currently is that there is no choice of where to put your starting base. Strategically, there's one location far superior to anything else, and that is somewhere around Cairo, Egypt. Nation relations come from protecting their airspace, and even if changed back to ground missions, this would remain the same. A Cairo base gives you coverage over more regions than anything else. Specifically, you get: Middle East - 100% coverage. Northern Africa - about 80% coverage, only losing the Western part like Mali, Mauritania, Algeria. Southern Africa - some coverage of about 30% Europe - looks like more than 60% coverage. Misses UK and Norway most notably Soviet Union - about 20% coverage, which is good for this massive region. Encompasses most major cities that can be bombed, too. Indochina - a sliver of coverage here, encompassing Afghanistan. Nothing else comes close to this positioning. Further, the funding region situation makes some other locations clearly worse than certain others for a secondary base. For example, consider a second base in the Americas. A base in mainland US is clearly inferior to a base in Mexico, not far from the Guatemalan border. Such a Mexican base can provide complete coverage of the Central American region with decent coverage of North America and some coverage of the South. A base around Beijing for instance is plain bad. I think there may be an easy solution to this. Currently, UFOs are spawned and assigned to a funding region. This means that it's far more important to cover more regions that land area. My proposal would be to assign UFOs to a random point of land when spawned. This would mean that putting your base somewhere where it can cover a lot of landmass but few regions (like a Beijing base that covers a lot of landmass but only Indochina/Soviet regions) would have a high probability of catching UFOs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dranak Posted January 6, 2014 Share Posted January 6, 2014 That's a nice proposal, I wonder if it would be reasonable for them to change though. I do agree that Egypt-ish and Cuba-ish are too clearly superior to all other locations for your first two bases. Could we also improve this by changing the funding values? Currently all regions are equal, maybe make NA, Europe, and Russia worth significantly more than Africa/Middle East/SA? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
legit1337 Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 Agreed. UFOs need to spawn in relation to area and not funding nations. Countries should also have unequal funding... I should be getting a crapload from USA, Russia, and Europe... Also, UFOs should appear in between waves. Not too many but one or two here and there to break the monotony. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StellarRat Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 Cairo actually is not the best starting position. It's only the best position if you have no intention to upgrade your radar coverage. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Belmakor Posted January 9, 2014 Share Posted January 9, 2014 I'd be all for any method that made me seriously consider not putting a base in the Baltic sea area or Mexico. This might be a daft idea but what if putting a base in a territory increased the funding there by, say $50,000 but with the caveat that it can't bring total funding from that region above $250,000. That would mean there was a financial incentive to try and drop a base in Southern Africa, or even Oceania as it would be netting you an extra $50,000 that a base in Europe or NA would not. OR How about making the relations level deteriorate a lot less in lesser areas of the globe if you decide to put a base there. They are so amazed that you are helping them! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saskali Posted January 9, 2014 Share Posted January 9, 2014 (edited) Actually your proposal wouldnt change anything solver it would only switch which place are the best for a starting position. Insead of maximising number of founding region coverage you would choose to maximise land coverage. So in both case the finish result would be approximately 4 optimal places to build our bases. The only difference would be in where those places are. ps: no harm intended only stating my point of view Edited January 9, 2014 by Saskali Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
llunak Posted January 9, 2014 Share Posted January 9, 2014 Actually your proposal wouldnt change anything solver it would only switch which place are the best for a starting position. Insead of maximising number of founding region coverage you would choose to maximise land coverage.So in both case the finish result would be approximately 4 optimal places to build our bases. The only difference would be in where those places are. No. If the number of regions matters (as opposed to pure land mass; and yes it does), there's just one best place - very roughly somewhere around Egypt you can at least partially cover 6 regions, which is unmatched. I personally think that non-equal funding should help with this a lot. If NAm, Eu and AA are the richest and Africas the poorest, the choice is suddenly not so obvious (although if both Eu and SU were both among the richest, ME would still be probably the best spot). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Solver Posted January 9, 2014 Author Share Posted January 9, 2014 Well, there are more places that give a lot of land area. It's not a perfect solution, but it would make bases in places like Kazakhstan, Western Brazil or Central Africa very viable. I would ideally like to see such a change combined with tweaks to nations so that they provide different funding levels. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saskali Posted January 9, 2014 Share Posted January 9, 2014 (edited) Well, there are more places that give a lot of land area. It's not a perfect solution, but it would make bases in places like Kazakhstan, Western Brazil or Central Africa very viable. I would ideally like to see such a change combined with tweaks to nations so that they provide different funding levels. Actually the first one should be in middle east yes (with current system), but who plays with only one base? you have to have more than one if you want to prevent region loss so in the end you have to build 3-4 bases. So you have one in middle east one in america and 1 near australia. And if you look at the end result you also end up with 3-4 bases that are always at the same place in a land coverage pattern. Your problem does not come from game design but from world design. Why do you think america is so attached to wage war in the middle east in real life? Might be the reason is it is a damn good strategic point . The center of the world if you exclude americaand australia. Edited January 9, 2014 by Saskali Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Solver Posted January 9, 2014 Author Share Posted January 9, 2014 Of course you build multiple bases, but the very first choice you make in the game is where to put your initial base, and that isn't really much of a choice now. It should be, though. Your first base is important as anyway the second base takes time to become operational. 15 days for a base with radar + hangars, 3 more days for Condors. It's really simple in the end. There are 10 regions in the game. An Egypt base can put 6 regions within your radar range, which other locations can't. If you place your second base in Mexico, that's coverage of 9 out of 10 regions with two bases. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Solver Posted January 9, 2014 Author Share Posted January 9, 2014 Of course you build multiple bases, but the very first choice you make in the game is where to put your initial base, and that isn't really much of a choice now. It should be, though. Your first base is important as anyway the second base takes time to become operational. 15 days for a base with radar + hangars, 3 more days for Condors. It's really simple in the end. There are 10 regions in the game. An Egypt base can put 6 regions within your radar range, which other locations can't. If you place your second base in Mexico, that's coverage of 9 out of 10 regions with two bases. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
llunak Posted January 9, 2014 Share Posted January 9, 2014 Actually the first one should be in middle east yes (with current system), but who plays with only one base? Everybody. Until they get a second base operational, which takes a while even if it's the top priority. Given how punishing leaving a region unprotected can be now, it makes a big difference. The other thing you don't seem to realize is that this is not only about one place being the best place, but also about most others being bad places. Right now placing the starting base anywhere in the Americas can turn out to be a very silly choice. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saskali Posted January 9, 2014 Share Posted January 9, 2014 (edited) Everybody. Until they get a second base operational, which takes a while even if it's the top priority. Given how punishing leaving a region unprotected can be now, it makes a big difference. The other thing you don't seem to realize is that this is not only about one place being the best place, but also about most others being bad places. Right now placing the starting base anywhere in the Americas can turn out to be a very silly choice. UFO appear at random so you migh end up with catching none with a base in egypt. But whatsoever i agree with you guys that an egypt base is by far the best choice, that is not my point. my point is that whatever the rules there will always be a best solution to start with. I m going to try to start a new game in a diffeent place next only doing airstrikes to speed up the process to see if it is doable. It would be a real problem if all other options meant a game over but even if egypt is a way better option i m not sur that a first cuban or indonesian base means a game over. Edit: i dont agee with you with all the other places being bad. A base in cuba allows you to cover ameica and is not a bad choice (always my 2 nd choice of base location. the same a base near vietnam gives you a good coverage of australia china russia india. So other choice are not all bad choice. And as solver stated having a second base running is 18 days so not that much time either. Not enough to make you loose i think. I think you must differientate being able to beat the game and beating the game in a perfect setup. Starting in a non best place might make it a bit more tough but it will then also be a bit more rewarding. Edited January 9, 2014 by Saskali Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrsisk Posted January 9, 2014 Share Posted January 9, 2014 You still want to cover as much landmass as possible just so you can get those ground missions. Especially early game they're a major source of income (and the only way to level up your soldiers, which you seriously need to do in order to get troops with decent TUs). Starting with a base in Cuba does cover several regions but it also cover a lot of ocean, which is useless for generating ground missions. You can "track until over land" but you always run the risk of running out of fuel before that condition is met. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vaultdweller Posted January 9, 2014 Share Posted January 9, 2014 I believe the previous system had the UFO's distributed more randomly across the globe, rather than targeting regions. That was changed, because it resulted in the aliens always pummeling the poor Australians. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ventuswings Posted January 10, 2014 Share Posted January 10, 2014 Ya I remember the good old days when Australia was alien hot-zone. Actually made building base over there worth it. 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.