Aborting a Mission

[JTzara]

Hi guys, and thanks for the game- it looks awesome and takes alot of my favourite elements of the X-com games and even improves on them. (I like that my team can survive a couple of hits from plasma weapons at the beginning, and they seem to be able to hit things, while still being at a suitable disadvantage- I always had to keep asking myself whether X-com _really_ was the best earth had to offer when they couldn't hit a barn door 3 feet in front of them on full auto :-))

I have a couple of questions, however. In the old games one of things that I really liked was that sometimes (esp early on when you don't yet have a handle on the them) you would find yourself being overwhelmed by the aliens, your top guy lying wounded and unconscious, and you'd decide to abort. Your last two guys would pick up what they could from the evac site, including the unconscious guy, limp back to the dropship, and head back to base with their tail between their legs, but maybe with enough to research that next time it would go better.

Now, on my build, if you evac, everyone dies, whether they're in the dropship or not, but the dropship always survives (in the old game if everyone died you'd lose the dropship, making the decision to abort even more important- those left for dead, but unconscious (or even just left behind...) were listed as MIA). Also, if someone gets killed, all their equipment is lost rather than left lying on the ground to be salvaged. This seems a shame, and takes out what could be one of the most exciting scenarios the game throws up. Any thoughts? If i'm aborting in the wrong way then please tell me!!

Many thanks, and congrats again on a great job. 

[BTAxis]

I'm hoping we can improve this in the future. It won't be soon, though.

[tasma3]

I really hope this is a feature we get soon, I am finding a bug once in a while where you cannot locate the last alien or there isnt one and the game wont end, that would help. I could just collect and end. Also, it would seem you cant pick up the bodies of aliens or members, is this something you will change?

[geever]

You won't get it soon. (There was a (fixed) bug in a map where alien could fall through the floor at a point...)

-geever

[Destructavator]

I thought about aborting a mission myself several times, I should have mentioned this before but I have several ideas on how to implement it:

One method would be if soldiers can reach a key square or tile in a randomly generated map, probably the one with the dropship, they would be considered "safe" and would survive in a mission abort.  I don't know if the game can easily sense which tile a soldier is located on, but if it can I'd imagine this would be relatively easy to implement without overhauling tons of maps.  For the maps that aren't generated randomly and don't include a dropship (I've seen maps like these), perhaps one border of the map could be designated as an exit, soldiers would proceed to the edge of the map.

Another idea, perhaps an invisible object or something could be placed on the map, once an abort is desired it could light up and soldiers would go to that spot for evacuation.  I'd imagine this idea also wouldn't make re-working tons of maps necessary, although I admit I could be wrong.

Something like these ideas could also be adapted for multi-part missions, meaning special missions where soldiers finish one map then go to a new battlescape instead of back out to the geoscape.

These ideas might also be good for new types of missions, such as rescue of a fighter pilot that got shot down (find the pilot, get them to the exit zone) and other missions so that not every one is "kill all aliens while avoiding civilian deaths."

Just ideas at this point, I admit I don't really know too much about the guts of the code and what would be easy to put in the game or not.

[odie]

Hi,

Just came across this thread and was wondering if anione played UFO Xcom's later series like UFO Aftershock?

They have an interesting concept we can consider adopting.

For the uninformed, here's how the game's movement is like:
1) Ground coverage to the UFO / Bunker for clearance.
2) Designated area for entry. Once there are soldiers in the designated area, and you click move to next area, onli the soldiers in the area move on to the nx part of the mission.
3) This way, u can decide to leave behind the heavier wounded soldiers, and moving the rest of the team to cover the next mission.

For us, of course we would not want to do that. We would want to leave the area with as many soldiers as possible. But as in most retreats, many most wounded soldiers DO get left behind, though USA's concept is leave no man behind.

Still, this is well, PHALANX. So, move as many soldiers into a designated evacuation area [EA] (perhaps within 5 or 8 squares of the bird). Then once u click evacuate, (with a confirmation dialogue), all soldiers within the EA are safe whilst those left behind are deemed MIA (killed or eaten watever.....)

What do the rest think?

[Valis]

In X-Com Apocalipse you had special fields on the edges of the battle map with arrows. If an alien, civilian or a soldier ended his [and here I do not remember] move/turn on such a field he would leave the mission.

Such feature is, as far as I know from the storyline topic, required by the campaign missions, expecially the last one

Spoiler:

blowing up the alien mother ship

[damn, there are not spoiler tags?]

[odie]

In X-Com Apocalipse you had special fields on the edges of the battle map with arrows. If an alien, civilian or a soldier ended his [and here I do not remember] move/turn on such a field he would leave the mission.

Such feature is, as far as I know from the storyline topic, required by the campaign missions, expecially the last one

Spoiler:

blowing up the alien mother ship

[damn, there are not spoiler tags?]

Apocalypse u mean, Valis? Yups. It is the case, especially the last one - and that is not a spoiler. Its a dead give-away. Lol.

But yes, back to point, to reach a designated area and if aborted, members are safe -this is wat i meant.

[BTAxis]

I kind of want a "safe zone" around the dropship on every mission that you have to fall back to when aborting a mission.

[odie]

I kind of want a "safe zone" around the dropship on every mission that you have to fall back to when aborting a mission.

I think that is a good idea. Its also from realism.
I remember some of the war movies having evacuation by copter, and they always have to establish a safe zone. Lets just say the safe zone is always available for our game's sake?

And lets say this zone is about 5-7 squares all around the (ENTRANCE AND EXIT) of the firebird. Not in front or behind. How about that?

[gerald]

In X-Com Apocalipse you had special fields on the edges of the battle map with arrows. If an alien, civilian or a soldier ended his [and here I do not remember] move/turn on such a field he would leave the mission.

Such feature is, as far as I know from the storyline topic, required by the campaign missions, expecially the last one

Spoiler:

blowing up the alien mother ship

[damn, there are not spoiler tags?]

in terror of the deep was things like that,multilevel missions,there was areas needed to be reached by all squad members wchich you want to go to other stage also all equip they want to use there.
 x-com and terror got similiar evac scheme,u got to take all soldiers and equip u want to evac inside dropship.
good thingy u was able to "wake up" unconcious soldiers and gather bodies and equip,was very helpfull when u got weak squad and want take an alien equipment or alien body u need to research progress.
would be nice have that here also

[odie]

in terror of the deep was things like that,multilevel missions,there was areas needed to be reached by all squad members wchich you want to go to other stage also all equip they want to use there.
 x-com and terror got similiar evac scheme,u got to take all soldiers and equip u want to evac inside dropship.
good thingy u was able to "wake up" unconcious soldiers and gather bodies and equip,was very helpfull when u got weak squad and want take an alien equipment or alien body u need to research progress.
would be nice have that here also

As in mission part 2? Not too sure if that will be implemented here. Need to ask the devs.

But that would really create a uber long campaign, considering that we cannot save progress (and will not implement this feature - agreed by devs.)

[gerald]

long campaign will keep ppl playing
well as for me would be nice have that evac option it helps really much

[Gunner]

You won't get it soon. (There was a (fixed) bug in a map where alien could fall through the floor at a point...)

-geever

would that be the one with the drop ship on the SW, a ridge on the East with a house and a barn on it with the crashed UFO scattered over the north? i would say the map name but i can't remember

[Gunner]

As in mission part 2? Not too sure if that will be implemented here. Need to ask the devs.

But that would really create a uber long campaign, considering that we cannot save progress (and will not implement this feature - agreed by devs.)

not being able to save in mission is a pain, but to easy to cheat with it on so i fully understand it not being there.

but the game would have to load the new level so it should be possible to add a save button to the end of mission summary so you can save between missions?