Rescue Mission

[jtgribs]

In the description of the Chinook it says that if it is shot down all aboard are lost.

Why?

When I shoot down a UFO that's not the case. There's wreckage and survivors and gear leftover. What if the same happened when MY transport got shot down?

Okay, so I send out my Chinook full of my best commandos and gear. Blam. It goes down. Now I have the option of sending a second team in. When I make my landing I get a message telling me how bad the crash is and the likelihood of there being survivors.

Somewhere on the map is the shattered remains of my Chinook, along with scattered corpses, gear, incapacitated xenonauts, and perhaps even a few particularly resilient, albeit injured and outnumbered, xenonauts.

The alien craft that shot them down or perhaps a separate transport is there to finish off my xenonauts. I have to fight my way to them. I win if I retrieve all survivors, including unconscious xenonauts, and return them to my Chinook, or if I defeat all aliens.

Alternatively the Chinook is shot down and gone. There is a random chance that within the next few days a garbled message will be received from survivors of the lost team. This opens a rescue mission somewhere near the crash site. Wounded survivors are holed up somewhere and dangerously low on ammo, desperately fighting to hold off the alien onslaught.

I think it would be an interesting change up and I might be less inclined to immediately reload a saved game upon losing my Chinook. A mission like that would be too damn fun to miss out on.

[anotherdevil]

In the description of the Chinook it says that if it is shot down all aboard are lost.

Why?

When I shoot down a UFO that's not the case. There's wreckage and survivors and gear leftover. What if the same happened when MY transport got shot down?

It's probably due to time, effort, and perhaps that the aliens have bigger guns than you? That and helicopters are really fragile things if hit in the wrong place...

[Beagle]

This actually sounds pretty cool. It would require extra development to handle the destroyed Chinook tiles, but fighting to your troops and then trying to make it out on the Chinook sounds like a cool, time sensitive objective.

EDIT: Following on from the idea of a time sensitive objective, I feel like it's an interesting idea to consider Xenonauts missions where there aren't a set number of enemies, but continuous reinforcements and you have to push through them/cover your back while accomplishing certain objectives, like retrieving something from a UFO, blowing up a base, or evacuating civilians. This changes up the gameplay from the very methodical standard of advance slowly, kill everything, though it would certainly be a lot more challenging.

Speaking of evacuating civilians, it'd also be neat if we could have them follow a guy back to the Chinook when we found them instead of them running around and ending up getting shot. This and the above are both fairly easy to explain ideas though so no point making extra threads.

Edited February 1, 2012 by Beagle

[anotherdevil]

This actually sounds pretty cool. It would require extra development to handle the destroyed Chinook tiles, but fighting to your troops and then trying to make it out on the Chinook sounds like a cool, time sensitive objective.

EDIT: Following on from the idea of a time sensitive objective, I feel like it's an interesting idea to consider Xenonauts missions where there aren't a set number of enemies, but continuous reinforcements and you have to push through them/cover your back while accomplishing certain objectives, like retrieving something from a UFO, blowing up a base, or evacuating civilians. This changes up the gameplay from the very methodical standard of advance slowly, kill everything, though it would certainly be a lot more challenging.

Speaking of evacuating civilians, it'd also be neat if we could have them follow a guy back to the Chinook when we found them instead of them running around and ending up getting shot. This and the above are both fairly easy to explain ideas though so no point making extra threads.

I see what you're getting at, and I like the direction, but I don't like the idea personally. I would hate it if I have all the tactics down pat, and then along comes a mission like this, and because I have to rush or be overwhelmed, I lose half my squad...

Not the only outcome of course, but one that could happen a lot. One of the beautiful things about TB games is that you have any amount of time you like. Mixing rushed with leisurely just seems odd to me =p

[xracer]

Ahhh the rescue missions I thought nobody will ever bring them up in this forums.

In general I like them but it seems that it never gets implemented, so here are my ideas on implementation.

To make it interesting you need to have the attacking force in this case a full alien force trying to preferably capture your soldiers but in the worse case kill them all.

As the player your goal is to reach the extraction point and run to it. Now here is where I loose everyone we all know that in a crash there are casualties however to be somewhat lineant with the player allow al soldiers to survive, but (big but) only allow a certain percentage to be combat able, that means that the rest of your soldiers are unconscious or dying so your first goal is to estabilize them I hope you took some medikit,

Now to move your wounded while fighting the aliens!!!!!! This also implies you need to carry your units, to make it simple you can do it the xcom way and put the soldier in your back pack, or the the logical way a llow for new sprites like fireman's carry, this will allow for the soldier to almost have a free hand to defen d himself, of course maybe the amount of wounded cannot be more than 50% the total number of soldiers

So those are my few ideas

Edited February 1, 2012 by xracer

[Pherret Of Doom]

Rescue mission sounds awesome! You could even have it setup where maybe the surviving squad members evac the wounded and gear they can to a suitable extraction point, radio for a pickup. give them a place to hole up while the aliens search for them. you have to come in clear the aliens and pickup your remaining team. that way there are no new tiles to render, you could possibly use the AI routines that the indigenous forces are going to use, up until the point you get your retrival team to the survivors.

[KOKON]

This mission have a very limited idea. After chinook is lost player would reload 99%.

But i think this mission could be done for flavour to have a 50% chence to occur only once per game.

If xenonauts had a release date second half of 2015.

If we had a superduper moddability of this game community would have a possibility to implement this type of mission. But superduper moddability needs at least one year to be focused and implemented.

Edited February 1, 2012 by KOKON

[jimbobfury]

This mission have a very limited idea. After chinook is lost player would reload 99%.

Isn't the point of Iron Man mode to avoid this kind of thing though, and make a player live with the circumstances of his actions? I know that's how I'll be playing!

[Gorlom]

IF getting the chinook shot down only costs you the chinook and not the soldiers (assuming you win the new rescue mission that spawns) theres no real point in reloading.

And as jimbobfury mentioned there's allways ironman mode.

[KOKON]

I will play ironman also.

Anyways i think that some survivablilty for the chinook crew should be added. If crashed you should have a chance for some crewmembers to survive. Possibly with some wounds. I would like to have almost entire crew alive if the demage was not too big.

As for rescure mission i don't believe aliens would really try to capture your soldiers after destroyng your aircraft.

However aliens can do even more harassment. For example in "Enemy Unknown" book written by Vladimir Vasilyev aliens are luring skyrangers from xcom base as a result the base was defended by few rookies. There was even an idea to use pilots armed with laser pistols until skyranger returns.

Here is the book btw:

http://www.amazon.com/Vrag-nevadom-Enemy-Vladimir-Vasiliev/dp/5170097328/ref=cm_cr_pr_pb_t/190-3537876-5458139

But unfortunately in russian. Very good book for Chris to read if we had it in english

Edited February 1, 2012 by KOKON

[Amiga4ever]

I like rescue idea:) and I think it isn't hard to add it to game

[Jean-Luc]

If something like this were implemented it wouldn't even need a rescue mission imo.

Whenever a dropship goes down there could be a virtual dice roll where anywhere between 10 - 50% of soldiers survive and return to base (after significant down time). After all we're fighting on home turf so it can be assumed governments would assist any downed troopers. We can also assume dropships would have parachutes and possibly other safety measures.

It could be something like this:

-Shot down over a friendly country with X+ approval rating - up to 50% of soldiers may survive

-Shot down over a not-as-friendly country with "less-than-X" approval rating - up to 30% survivors

-Shot down over sea - up to 20% survivors

-Shot down over a hostile zone (lost to aliens) - up to 10% with there always being a possibility of at least one guy coming back

It needn't be percentage based if that's too awkward. Since the maximum numbers of guys per mission is 16 iirc (excluding vehicles) it could also go like this:

-Friendly territory - up to 10 soldiers "roll" for survival (a separate roll for each guy), each roll has 50% chance of going either way. More advanced dropships could tip the scales in favor of survival.

-Less friendly territory - up to 6

-Water/hostile zone - up to 3

Pretty simple imo.

Edited February 1, 2012 by Jean-Luc

[Amiga4ever]

I remember something like that in a game. But I don't remember the title

Both idea are good but I vote for Ground Battle

Edited February 1, 2012 by Amiga4ever

[aliencrush]

i must say i like the idea in the way Jean-Luc say it.

but i also vote for Ground Battle after the air crash

but over sea you could skip the battle.

[KOKON]

Both idea are good but I vote for Ground Battle

Well do you think aliens would try to capture your squad everytime? Thats a bullshit.

Aliens have different classes of spaceships. Some of them are not for the ground assault. Some of them are not supposed to land earth at all. What do you propose guys wtf?

Edited February 1, 2012 by KOKON

[Chris]

A ground battle isn't going to happen, it's really not the best use of our resources.

Having some soldiers survive the crash and be returned to base is actually quite a good idea. Right now the loss of a transport is incredibly punishing and is basically save / load territory. It could work like this:

- If shot down over friendy territory each soldier could have a 25% chance of surviving unharmed, a 25% chance of death and a 50% chance of sustaining a random amount of injury / wounding.

- If shot down over enemy territory (a nation lost to the enemy) there could be a 25% chance of surviving unharmed, a 50% chance of death and a 25% chance of sustaining a random amount of injury / wounding

- If shot down over the sea, all units are lost.

That'd make it a bit less devastating than it currently is.

[Chris]

Actually, I'll have the crash survival added to our February milestone. I think it is quite a good idea.

[KOKON]

- If shot down over friendy territory each soldier could have a 25% chance of surviving unharmed, a 25% chance of death and a 50% chance of sustaining a random amount of injury / wounding.

- If shot down over enemy territory (a nation lost to the enemy) there could be a 25% chance of surviving unharmed, a 50% chance of death and a 25% chance of sustaining a random amount of injury / wounding

- If shot down over the sea, all units are lost.

I think it should depend on the demage beyond hp. I.e. battleship can evaporate entire chinook with it's crew if they do not eject at the time they spot it on the radar

[xracer]

hmmmm don't mean to be difficult, but if you re creating those parameter, couldn't you simply apply those parameters the same as an alien crash is programmed.

The only real difference is that in this case all the casualties are in the human side. of course the implementation of the wounded in the battle field and the extraction point, could be a simply mission like, get all your soldiers to point X and hold position for 5 turns which is also part of the program right now.

I understand there are certain things that will need to be modified and i am not saying it is easy. but it seems a lot of the coding needed is already there just needed to be "tweaked" to fit the human side.

About the wounded to simplify it could be done the same way as it is now and allow for bodies to be put into the backpack.

This is a followup thread of another forum that was discussing the implementation of the wounded, this was based on the idea of having a rescue mission and having wounded from the crash.

http://ufo-scene.com/plugins/forum/forum_viewtopic.php?10020.post

in case you do not want to link to it, here is a copy of it "my perspective"

Well i have been thinking (i know i don't usually do)

First can a exit point be created in different maps, you know good old Xcom style, if you wanted to abort a mission you will need to be in your ship to go home if you were in an alien base you needed to be at an exit point and so on. Right now you abort a mission and only your healthy soldier return.

Which brings me to a second point. How feasible will it be to implement being able to abort a mission and be able to carry your unconscious soldiers with you. You know again a la Xcom style.

I know in xcom you put your man in your back pack and carried them, I know that is not so logical. but what about if someone can create sprites for a fireman carrier Fireman carry or the cradle drop drag technique.

-----------

Of course i forgot to mention, there will be penalties for example in the first you will be able to use only a hand gun to defend your self, in the later you are defenseless.

Furthermore there will be movement penalties such as FC (fireman carry) you move half as fast and CDD (cradle drop drag) you move 1/4 as fast.

Now you will ask so why would i want to use the CDD, and the answer is because you can only use FC if you are strong or have the capacity to carry the body i don't know probably GF will find correct logic for it, the CDD is when you can't carry the unit thus have to drag it.

This could go hand in hand with medals or awards for actions above and beyond the call of duty try to provide incentives other than the obvious "you never leave your man/woman behind"

Of course this will probably be implemented in version 5.xx of UNI-MOD i bet it will take a little work if possible at all.

As you can see this also touches on the award system that was discussed in this forums is all a big link

I need to find that design doc that had all this written in it

[Gorlom]

Well do you think aliens would try to capture your squad everytime? Thats a bullshit.

This is kind of funny comming from the guy that advocates "not understandting aliens reasoning or motives" as hard as he does (well at least did in his first 4-6 posts on the forum)...

[Jean-Luc]

A ground battle isn't going to happen, it's really not the best use of our resources.

Having some soldiers survive the crash and be returned to base is actually quite a good idea. Right now the loss of a transport is incredibly punishing and is basically save / load territory. It could work like this:

- If shot down over friendy territory each soldier could have a 25% chance of surviving unharmed, a 25% chance of death and a 50% chance of sustaining a random amount of injury / wounding.

- If shot down over enemy territory (a nation lost to the enemy) there could be a 25% chance of surviving unharmed, a 50% chance of death and a 25% chance of sustaining a random amount of injury / wounding

- If shot down over the sea, all units are lost.

That'd make it a bit less devastating than it currently is.

Thanks, this will make ironman mode a lot more enjoyable I think. Having 10 guys wiped out in a disastrous mission is one thing but loosing a drop ship along with all hands and equipment due to an aerial fluke could really kill the mood.

I'd a suggest a small survival rate for aquatic crashes as well (75% death, 25% injury, no one gets out unscathed). Arguably a drop ship would be equipped with things like parachutes, inflatable rafts (or at least life vests), emergency rations, radios and such and a mayday before the crash is very likely as well. Getting stuck in the middle of the Atlantic is definitely nasty even under the best of circumstances but the military or civilian authorities would likely assist in these situations. It needn't be certain death.

[KOKON]

I thought about emergency landing or eject command during the battle to loose your aircraft but save the team. But it won't be fun to press this button.

Ok about alien motivation. It should not look too much suicidal. Btw it would be fun to have some ufos following your chinook/intenceptors but avoiding to engage.

P.S.: I don't like how close interceptors are getting to ufo without starting a battle. It would be more fun to have it like in xcom eu

Edited February 1, 2012 by KOKON

[Gauddlike]

Having a chance of survival would be a really good addition.

If the numbers were tied into the difficulty settings of the game (and adjustable in custom games) it would be even better.

As Chris has made the evil decision to have some alien ships hunt down your dropship it's only fair he gives us a chance to survive

[anotherdevil]

Actually, I'll have the crash survival added to our February milestone. I think it is quite a good idea.

Awesome!

Also guys I believe Iron Man mode means you can't save during ground combat. I don't think it affects ho often you can save on the geoscape...

[Jean-Luc]

I'm pretty sure it's "save & quit" a la Diablo, applicable to both geo and battlescape. It really is the best and simplest way to do this but I could be wrong. Not being able to save at all (during specific game stages) would mean you have to leave the game running if you need to suddenly leave or be forced to play out the battle even if you don't feel like doing it at that time. It's an unnecessary inconvenience.