Weight penalties

[NocLQ3V7]

I did compile new version from source few hours ago and noticed that there are now weights reported on inventory screen, also my soldiers have only around 16TU's while before they had nearly 30.

If I understand correctly weight penalties have been implemented, at least can't remember seeing weights before this in my short trip to UFO:AI world.

One of my soldier has 16.7kg/25kg load and it shows up as red which probably means weight penalties being in effect.

Soldier has following equipments:
Laser rifle
2x DF-L cartridges
Frag. grenade
Flashbang
Medikit

Soldier has also Nano armor.

With bit of testing I found out that it is not possible to wear nano armor without weight penalty which in practice means that can't use medikit at all because only 16TU's is maximum.

Probably balancing of feature is still under way as feature is very new one?

Thought to let you know about what I found out, but might be planned?

What I think is that maybe there is bug making weight penalty so early before reaching that 25kg, but as I'm so new I can only guess and be probably wrong in many aspect, don't hit the face

[H-Hour]

Yes, it looks like DarkRain added the weight penalty last night. Balancing still in the works.

[ShipIt]

The new weight system effects savegames in a unfavorable way. The strength of soldiers is just too low. For new games the starting strenght value is increased to 30 - 39.

A soldier can carry up to half his strength value in kg without getting a penalty.

[DexCisco]

Shouldn't a weight penalty just increase movement TU cost rather than reducing overall TUs available?  I suppose that might not provide enough room for fine tuning, unless the base TUs were increased or fractional TUs were used.  I'm just thinking for example about someone with a heavy MG.  They are slow to get into position, but once there they can fire normally.  The time to shoot shouldn't change but the time to move should and the total time available to a unit should be fairly consistent.

[NocLQ3V7]

Shouldn't a weight penalty just increase movement TU cost rather than reducing overall TUs available?  I suppose that might not provide enough room for fine tuning, unless the base TUs were increased or fractional TUs were used.  I'm just thinking for example about someone with a heavy MG.  They are slow to get into position, but once there they can fire normally.  The time to shoot shouldn't change but the time to move should and the total time available to a unit should be fairly consistent.

But if one swings that MG 90 degrees or even 60 degrees to right, guy with pistol still can do it faster, also if walking with the MG and one need to shoot all of sudden, it will take longer to make first shot with MG than with pistol.

Also everything you carry increases your inertia, making movements indeed slower.

I think reducing available TUs can work just fine as it really reduces events you can do for given time, which is what slower movements will do, must test with new game, good to know that it renders savegames bit useless.

If one has gun trained to target already, there lower TU usage to shoot might be of course something to look into, or maybe there already is such, but I haven't just found that?

[H-Hour]

In addition to NocLQ3V7's comments, I would add that adjusting TU cost to move would undermine consistency in the most persistent action in the battlescape. By mid-game, most players will develop an intuitive sense of how far they can get with x TUs, and this smooths out the gameplay considerably. Were we to introduce variable TU costs, a player would constantly have to check the TU cost for every soldier and do the math for every move they make. Since modifying the overall TUs available is effective at producing nearly identical tactical problems, it's worth preserving the clarity of this aspect of the game.

And yes, the question of whether a soldier who has already trained his gun on one area should get a TU bonus for subsequent shots in that area is a separate feature which we don't support at this time.

[Anarch Cassius]

The new weight system effects savegames in a unfavorable way. The strength of soldiers is just too low. For new games the starting strenght value is increased to 30 - 39.

Forgive me but that seems like rather bad planning.

Humans were already starting at 15-25 or so, so you don't have a wider range and in either case there's plenty of room to make noticeably higher or low strengths.

So why not just calibrate the weight system to the existing human baseline? Why make it nearly twice as high? Are some races really that much weaker than humans and in need of a range of strength or values.

[ShipIt]

So why not just calibrate the weight system to the existing human baseline?

We choose to do so because with the base formula (1 strength equals 1 kg) it is way more easy for the player. Right now the problem is to get a proper UI implementation to give the player the information he needs.

Of course we could have done different. There is always another way.

[Anarch Cassius]

It just seems a bit odd on a couple levels.

For one it's basically broken the old save games. I can finish out my game with an older copy but it's a bit of a shock.

The other matter is one of scale. I would expect the ratings in stats to have some relative meaning. That is to say 1 is about the feablest imaginable and 100 is about the most powerful imaginable within the context of the game.

The new values mean the strongest creature is going to be 2.5 times average human strength, not exactly what I'd expect. It also means Strength is now Human's 'best' stat numerically.

The Amount you can carry based on Strength actually seems like it could be completely convoluted to calculate and not affect people's experience much. The game handles that. The player knows more is better and how much each soldier can carry; the exact kg from str calculation is rarely a matter.

In other words, it seems to be that the Strength value's relationship to Accuracy is something the player is going to be caring far more about than that to Kg. Before a player would look at stats and think "Humans are weak", now they will think "Humans are strong".

Of course to play devil's advocate the real reason you'd want such high Strength numbers is that it gives you finer control of Strength differences. Gains can be more subtle and such.

[ko5tik]

I would say that came out of sudden and pretty hard -  my soldiers are not heavy loaded (  sniper rifle - 2 grenades , 2 clips and medpack with nano armour ) and time units went from 30+ to under 20 (so no aimed shot at all, even if there is no movement involved).  Paired with random crashes and freezes it is pretty frustrating.

[NocLQ3V7]

I would say that came out of sudden and pretty hard -  my soldiers are not heavy loaded (  sniper rifle - 2 grenades , 2 clips and medpack with nano armour ) and time units went from 30+ to under 20 (so no aimed shot at all, even if there is no movement involved).  Paired with random crashes and freezes it is pretty frustrating.

Sniper can't really have medikit, try to remove weight so that load stays green and you have all TU's again. Which brings to my finding, if I add combat knife to loaded soldier I get half of TU's vs without adding combat knife, so current system is kind of on/off, maybe plan is to develop system to be so that it gradually takes TU's away more you add weight? That way penalty would appear more natural, but I have no idea how complex such is or what it would break.

Overall I like the change, brings up importance of tactical planning as one can't have whole armory with him, so one has to change items per mission.

[ko5tik]

ok, now all my soldiers are completely useless -   no one can wear nanocomposite armour without penalty, and
dumb armour does not help in late game stages.

[H-Hour]

We'll try to get a proper write-up of the weight system soon so you can understand it, but here are the thresholds you'll hit.

0-20% of max-weight carried will get you the full TUs (which are now 40+)
20-50% of max-weight carried will get you "normal" TUs
50+% of max-weight carried and you will have very low TUs.

We recognize that this is a particularly painful transition for those playing the dev version, but we have no simple fix for you. Sorry about that.

[ShipIt]

Whereas max-weight is the strenght value in kg.

[Anarch Cassius]

Okay so that 44 TU Ortnok I have in Multiplayer isn't my imagination or a bug. That's some consolation and a boost for dedicated medics.

The carry weights seem a tad low even with new characters. The maximum weight is a good measure for the most a character can carry but the halfway mark is basically ridiculously overburdened.

40lbs/18kg is a hefty load and certainly encumbering but I'd think you could still fight if you had to. Right now getting the penalty almost puts a character out of action. Maybe if it were more like:

0-20% of max-weight: Bonus TUs
20-50% of max-weight: Normal TUs
50-80% of max-weight: Small penalty, ~30%-60% as bad as the current one
80-100% of max-weight: Current penalty
100%+ of max-weight: Immobilized

Also the console indicates the savefile is compressed XML... I don't suppose there's any way to uncompress it and well... "cheat"? I could just add 15 to each soldier's base str and go on my way