Why Alien Scouts don't hunt Human Transports?

[Alexandre Lange]

Hey, guys.

I have noticed that alien fighters attack human transports, but alien scouts don't (except for landed ones, that sometimes fight back transports trying to land). Why, if they have the firepower to put transport down, and can do it without consequence if the transport has no escort?

[SNOWMAN]

Becuase they're scouts?

[Max_Caine]

Following a string of of evolutionary changes to this particular issue, only UFOs with the air superiority mission type will go after dropships, only fighter craft have the air superiority mission type, and only one squadron in a wave can ever be tasked with the air superiority mission.

[Malthus]

You are a scout in interplanetary war. You are in the mid of your scouting run and then you scout an unarmed transport while you have enough weapons to shoot them to pieces with no risk for yourself. Sounds like a good plan to earn a promotion These psions are no mindless thralls or am I wrong?

[Prudent Viper]

Because it would be difficult to balance? Why not let every alien ship target transports? Can you imagine having to have enough fighters to escort your chinooks, as well as clearing the skies? What about long distance terror missions, which are out of range of your interceptors?

Also, Malthus, that would be deemed dereliction of duty by any human military, more likely resulting in a demotion or even a dishonourable discharge. One does not simply abandon a very important recon mission for the sake of shooting down a eight man transport.

How do they know it's a military transport, anyhow? We never find out the full extent of alien intle on human forces. Justifiably, a simple civilian passenger jet may seem like a military airplane to them.

Finally, the reason I put human in bold in the previous paragraph. This is not a human military. Stop applying human traits to the aliens. Most of them are mindless drones anyway, and probably don't have the slightest desire to obtain a promotion, if such a concept even exists to them.

[Chris]

Basically, because players get really annoyed if all the UFOs try to shoot down their dropships. They used to do that, but now it's just air superiority missions that do so.

[Skybirduk]

Anyway, maybe the scouts and other non-fighters have atrocious manoeuvring and sensor capability at low altitude, as that is the height that the transport will be flying at.

[Commissar Pancakes]

Or perhaps that brings them close in enough for local air defenses to be able to knock them out of the sky, so the UFOs never descend that low unless they wish to land.

[Alexandre Lange]

Humans with a 1979 technology can classify, track and hunt down ufos/aliens. Aliens capable of space travel cannot distinguish the transport from the only human force that fight their invasion? Not a good explanation. I like the simple answer from Chris: because we, reflecting the player's wish, want that way. I like the high/low altitute approach too. Good enough to me.

Thanks, guys. And just to be clear: I am with you, not the aliens, ok? I LOVE this game, and I like to make friends.

[Skybirduk]

The UFO's are coming in from outer space and flying at high altitudes, so they would be easy to spot on Radar, Visual and other scanning, especially as they would be the only traffic that high.

The transport would be lower altitude at subsonic speeds. Now, just how much airborne traffic is going on at the same time, personal aircraft, civilian airliners, etc. Any sensible transport pilot would pretend to be regular traffic, flying along the commercial routes until they got close, then they would divert to the crash site. going back they would blend in with routes as well. (Addon: trying to add the route diversions to the game would just be a distraction.)

Any alien scout would either have to start blasting down lots of aircraft at very long range or slow down for a closer inspection to make sure that it has the right target.

Don't forget that RAM (Radar-absorbent material) would have been available at this time which may also provide some protection.

[TacticalDragon]

You are a invader, you dont know too much about humans, you have low weapon capacity. Its understandable that if your inteligent try to evade any ships.

[vaultdweller]

Alternately: you are an invader, you have 100% confidence in your absolute superiority and regard the human forces as insects that can never truly oppose you. You're in the atmosphere for a specific assigned mission (scouting, abduction, terror, whatever). It's understandable that you'd stick to your mission, and not take a detour to swat at gnats.

[Dranak]

Alternatively alternatively: It may (questionably) make more "sense" for the aliens to attack our transports, but it makes for much worse gameplay based on playtesting.

[Skybirduk]

Alternatively alternatively: It may (questionably) make more "sense" for the aliens to attack our transports, but it makes for much worse gameplay based on playtesting.

All the military would have to do is send multiple Chinooks at low level towards a crash site, which would mean multiple targets to engage, and deploy plenty of mobile SAM units along the way so that the scouts could be shot down.

[Jean-Luc]

Or alt-alt-alternatively.

[Commissar Pancakes]

But...!! BUT APPLE INC. was founded only 3 years prior to Xenonauts!

We're all doomed!!

[Skybirduk]

Or alt-alt-alternatively.

Where there's a Wil, there's a way...