Alien Psionic Powers Discussion

[PraetorNimitz]

Meh, something must be done about psionics. Currently, I am unwilling to play on ironman because of the possibility of my singularity-cannon guy getting MC'd and vaporizing my entire squad. When that or something similar happens, Xenonauts ceases to be fun and becomes a chore. That's what the current MC system contributes to the game. Having to drop your weapons each turn so that your guys don't murder each other is not what I consider to be fun. Be it mitigation by bravery, psi-inhibitors, or some other tech that makes your men and women resistant to psionic attacks, psionics must be changed in order for them to be a positive aspect of Xenonauts.

[Name]

Arnt they only supposed to use powers if squadie is in LOS of any alien?

[Gauddlike]

Yes but there are a lot of reports that this is not working properly.

It makes it difficult to balance a system when it is probably not working in the first place.

You either nerf it to hell so it isn't too overpowered with the bug in place then rebalance once you find and fix the bug or find the bugs first and then do the balance pass.

I think GH have chosen the latter course which makes sense to me.

[OzoneGrif]

I just had an interesting game with psion powers giving my soldiers unnerving and often berserk. One of my soldier killed a team-mate during his berserk, she just got crazy, turned around, and shot two times at point blank.

I found a counter : never keep TUs at the end of turn (jog little soldiers, jog and burn these TUs!). That's quite game breaking since you remove the whole concept of reflex shots. Plus making your soldiers jog around isn't really elegant.

I also noted that getting suppressed doesn't improve your bravery. Almost nothing improves your bravery... which makes it difficult to have strong minded soldiers who resist Psychics.

[StellarRat]

I just had an interesting game with psion powers giving my soldiers unnerving and often berserk. One of my soldier killed a team-mate during his berserk, she just got crazy, turned around, and shot two times at point blank.

I found a counter : never keep TUs at the end of turn (jog little soldiers, jog and burn these TUs!). That's quite game breaking since you remove the whole concept of reflex shots. Plus making your soldiers jog around isn't really elegant.

I also noted that getting suppressed doesn't improve your bravery. Almost nothing improves your bravery... which makes it difficult to have strong minded soldiers who resist Psychics.

You can also have them put their weapons on the ground at the end of each turn. It's just hokey. There's no other way to put it. I used to do that in the OG too.

[silenced]

I found a counter : never keep TUs at the end of turn (jog little soldiers, jog and burn these TUs!). That's quite game breaking since you remove the whole concept of reflex shots. Plus making your soldiers jog around isn't really elegant.

Not really a counter. If they berserk they get their whole TU at the beginning of the turn. But berserk is not always 'shoot next target'. You can be lucky, or really unlucky.

But, berserk is not that bad. Much worse is 'Under Alien Control'. Because of this is almost a guaranteed death for one of your soldiers.

Best way is: save often in Geoscape, build that quantum decryption thingie in every base and airstrike everything that's called 'Ceasan'. Anything else can be intervened in ground combat, just hope the 'Praetor' died on crash. If not: spread out and capture it. And, highest priority: shot down ANY UFO that has Ceasans on board AND mission: Terror. You certainly do not want to have a Ceasan Terror Mission. This is REAL terror.

[Caaygun]

General:

I also find that psionic attacks seem somewhat OP, but since caesans are weaker than other enemies, that's their power now, and finally that pesky psion found some use. When psionic attack is made LoS, or very short range when no LoS (like being in the next room) it will finally be nicely balanced.

Berserk:

I am noticing that berserked soldiers are not using their machine guns at all, just spending Tus, this might be a bug maybe, or is it some counter I'm employing without knowing the mechanics?

Berserk now nicely prioritizes enemies, that feels like nice balance. Maybe having enemies in sight can increase berserk chance of unnerved soldiers?

Mind Control:

We might also get a counter for MC, like stun rod vs. our own soldier. Or bravery resisting it.

Or at least something like the affected soldier depleting some of his Tus in vain with a message like:

"trying to resist the mental probing of a powerful pshychic entity"

so higher bravery soldiers gets less Tus for the alien puppetmaster to use, and none when just too high, or unable to control.

[legit1337]

Mind Control:

We might also get a counter for MC, like stun rod vs. our own soldier. Or bravery resisting it.

Or at least something like the affected soldier depleting some of his Tus in vain with a message like:

"trying to resist the mental probing of a powerful pshychic entity"

so higher bravery soldiers gets less Tus for the alien puppetmaster to use, and none when just too high, or unable to control.

I don't know. I think mind control should hit pretty hard considering it is the "ultimate" psi attack. Bravery should definitely be a factor in resisting it though, and it should be an LOS only ability.

Perhaps to stop it being so "binary" (either they mind control your soldier or nothing happens), a successful save against mind control makes the soldier suppressed, because he is trying to fight off a dominating psychic presence. A failed save would of course allow the enemy to control him.

[Skitso]

Perhaps to stop it being so "binary" (either they mind control your soldier or nothing happens), a successful save against mind control makes the soldier suppressed, because he is trying to fight off a dominating psychic presence. A failed save would of course allow the enemy to control him.

That's actually a darn good idea.

[Caaygun]

Perhaps to stop it being so "binary" (either they mind control your soldier or nothing happens), a successful save against mind control makes the soldier suppressed, because he is trying to fight off a dominating psychic presence. A failed save would of course allow the enemy to control him.

I also agree that this is a great idea. Suppression, can also be implemented on lesser pshchic attacks like dread or unnerving. After all, dread may represent the unnerved soldier feeling his mind is being screwed with by a powerful psychic entity.

Though psychic being LoS only breaks the immersion a little maybe. Though a while ago someone had an idea of revealing the attacker (simulating that the alien's image appearing to the victim in his mind). Surely not from across the map but now that thinking about it, I think it needs to stay from within the next room, like when you are approaching the command room of the alien base. It would add to the feeling of tenseness.

Currently I find that all alien command crew is rushing me. This is fine for sebilians, it has a lore side to it: the warrior officers leading the charge against the intruders. Though for Caesans, his psychic powers emanating from his command lair would cause the tension build up and be the distinguishing factor of his race from others. And certainly so for the preator. Dread, MC, other mindscrew starts to unnerve and disperse your team as you get close to him. He might even be given some passive abilities like dread chance purely by being near him or within LoS. It will balance nicely and with variation together with his MC toned down a little.

Edit: Is it possible to give soldiers stat buff / debuff by the way?

Edited April 29, 2014 by Caaygun

[OzoneGrif]

To be fun to play, mind control should definitely give a one turn warning.

The soldier should fight the mind control for the first turn. As a player, you have three solutions : either kill the psion, knock your soldier out, or run away to not get shot by your own man.

The game is already hard enough, and giving no possibility to counter an attack isn't what I call fun.

[Chaos Marine]

How about introducing tinfoil hate upgrades to the armours?

[Selgald]

Without reading the 12 pages, psionic powers are way way way too strong. After one stupid turn, ally my soldiers start berserking and the team killing starts.

I see no difference in how good a soldier is trained, they just berserk.

With V22RC6 now this happens also in mid-game. I dont play all of my endgames saves anymore because, its just "feel" horrible to play them, no fun at all

Is there a mod oder any other way to disable psionics?

[wcanyon]

Is there a mod oder any other way to disable psionics?

Yes. Read this thread

[wcanyon]

How about introducing tinfoil hate upgrades to the armours?

Sounds silly, but I don't think this is unreasonable. Psionics should be a "HOLY HELL WTF" moment at first and then the science team should get a handle on it and then come up with armor upgrades ("Psi Hardened Helmet") that you have to build out.

Also, making psionics be only LOS seems sorta silly to me. Do they operate over laser beam? Even radio waves aren't line of sight. Feels hacky.

[kabill]

Also, making psionics be only LOS seems sorta silly to me. Do they operate over laser beam? Even radio waves aren't line of sight. Feels hacky.

I'm not sure it's 'silly' for aliens to need to know where their intended target is before they can use their crazy-mind-powers, though. It's certainly not any more silly than aliens magically knowing exactly where your soldiers are for the purposes of psionic attacks, and not more of a hack.

[StellarRat]

Even radio waves aren't line of sight. Feels hacky.

That's not actually true. I'm not going to go into all the details, but radio waves can be VERY directional. If you want more info I'll be happy to discuss what I know in a different thread.

[legit1337]

That's not actually true. I'm not going to go into all the details, but radio waves can be VERY directional. If you want more info I'll be happy to discuss what I know in a different thread.

Was about to say the same thing lol.

[StellarRat]

Everyone should bear in mind that psionics changes are coming so this thread may have outlived it usefulness, at least for the time being.

[wcanyon]

radio waves can be VERY directional.

You realize that I didn't say they couldn't be directional? All I said was that they aren't line of sight - meaning they can go through walls.

Anyway, my point with radio was that whatever magic powers psionic powers there's no reason for it to be line of sight -- since I have to assume it isn't happening via photons. If it _is_ photons (if you want to take the rather unadvisable step of actually explaining psionics) then you have to explain how they get through the skull but can't get through any object between the target and sender.

I think if you're gonna go handwavey just do it and don't try to explain things away.

[Gauddlike]

There is a difference between psi powers relying on some kind of direct transmission method and the alien needing to see its target in order to be able to focus its mind on it.

A bullet can be fired through a plasterboard wall but unless you know where your target is you are unlikely to hit it.

I can easily imagine that something basic like causing a non specific feeling of dread could be projected to an area, for example using squad sight so that the psi user has a rough idea of the location.

A specific attack like mind control may need a much tighter focus and require the psi user to be able to see the target.

To belabour the bullet analogy it is like hosing down an area with a machine gun compared to taking an aimed shot at a targets head.

There is no reason for them to be line of sight as they are imaginary powers but there is also no reason they shouldn't be if it is better for balance.

[Larus]

You realize that I didn't say they couldn't be directional? All I said was that they aren't line of sight - meaning they can go through walls.

Anyway, my point with radio was that whatever magic powers psionic powers there's no reason for it to be line of sight -- since I have to assume it isn't happening via photons. If it _is_ photons (if you want to take the rather unadvisable step of actually explaining psionics) then you have to explain how they get through the skull but can't get through any object between the target and sender.

I think if you're gonna go handwavey just do it and don't try to explain things away.

Don't know if we should discuss this here but radio waves and light are both electromagnetic radiation. These ways don't go through anything since they have no impact as long as they aren't very short (good old particle- wave duality), but they can go around objects. The longer they are the better they can be be bent an object. Radio waves are very long, much longer than light which has only a few hundert nano-meter long waves.

If a wave is too short to go around will it hit the object and some get absorbet or deflected (Colour for example is the ability of an object to absorb, emit or deflect light in a certain wave length). Micro waves can this way be used to heat things up and even shorter waves like x-ras can already pirce through our body and can cause cancer by smashing through our DNA.

Long story short, light has just enough impact to enter our eyes, radio waves can around nearly everything and all waves can fly very directed. Hope I got everything right, has been a while since I studied that stuff

[wcanyon]

Don't know if we should discuss this here but radio waves and light are both electromagnetic radiation.

Well they're both photons, so yes.

These wa[ves] don't go through anything since they have no impact as long as they aren't very short (good old particle- wave duality), but they can go around objects. The longer they are the better they can be be bent an object. Radio waves are very long, much longer than light which has only a few hundert nano-meter long waves.

That's... no. Not what happens. Long story short: if you're a photon, some things are essentially invisible to you and some are not.

Here:

This leads us to a more precise answer to your question than the one I gave you above in PART2A. The real key is hidden in the STRUCTURE of the WALL. It matters, what the wall is made from, what kinds of atoms and molecules are its constituents. Also it is very important HOW these atoms in the wall are tight together.

As you know, every atom has a shell of electrons. These electrons interact between each of other and also interact with the outside world. The properties of these electrons dictate, whether a certain kind of incoming electromagnetic wave will go through or will not.

Some materials have the electron structure such, that they to be transparent for light but not for ultraviolet radiation ( for example glass, you will never get sun burned behind a window). But you can safely listen radio in your room. Glass is transparent to radio waves.

Some other materials have a different electron structure of their atoms, so they are not transparent for light, but are transparent for radio waves. Let us say a brick wall.

Also, as I said, you can find materials ( conductors, such as gold, iron, silver) that are neither transparent for radio waves nor for light.

CONCLUSION2: The atomic structure, especially the properties of the electron shells of atoms in the wall dictate if that particular wall to be transparent or not for a certain type of electromagnetic wave.

https://www.fnal.gov/pub/inquiring/questions/mikep.html

[Larus]

I'm not entirly sure what you want to express here. Waves can pass a solid objects without going through it, what you descript here seems to be about passing through and not around.

And of course can't anything pass through everything. That why people wear a lead vest when they work with x-rays. These short waves can't go around your body and would otherwise smash their way through.

I'm sorry for derailing the thread here and I never had the intention to talk down to you but we better limit our discussion to private massages if you want to continue.

[Gauddlike]

It has gone a little off the topic.

Maybe it will be best to wait and see what the next build brings before worrying further about this.