project-navigation
Personal tools

Author Topic: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)  (Read 14313 times)

Offline anonymissimus

  • Sergeant
  • *****
  • Posts: 347
    • View Profile
My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« on: August 29, 2014, 12:48:34 am »
Did anybody ever come out of this map saving more civilians than the two from the spawnpoints near the player's starting position (one near the red phone box, the other one in the backyard to the right) ? If so, using which tactics ?
The extremely annoying thing about this map is that it forces the player to waste its turn to move up the stairs. Killing aliens on first turn, posing as replacement target, throwing smoke at civilians, nothing helps or is possible. There's an evil wall to the left from the staircase, preventing shooting on 2 aliens that spawn on the plane with the playground. I still managed to kill 2 on my first turn this time (with grenade launcher, shooting over the wall), which is really a lot for this map. But 5 of 6 civilians died anyway, because the one from the backyard decided to pose by running upstairs to flee from an alien that killed my cannonfodder, instead of calculating that I would kill that alien anyway during my turn and allowing me to cover her in smoke. I once came out saving 50% of civilians, but only since there were only 4 of them - the two near to me survived. I recall that this map was already bloody in 2.4 even. Even more so in 2.5.

Offline Noordung

  • Squad Leader
  • ****
  • Posts: 285
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #1 on: August 29, 2014, 08:02:27 am »
picture of map would help... anyway i ususally save my troops. civilians are not priority. so i build my relationship with countries a lot slower...

Offline Internecivus

  • Rookie
  • ***
  • Posts: 64
  • Sometimes I Code
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #2 on: August 29, 2014, 01:30:16 pm »
Yep, I remember that map. Well, it's pure luck and rush map. Yes, few times I was able to save more than two civilians, but half of my squad was near to death, but I also did a lot of retries so I don't bother anymore to be successful civilian saver on that map.

Offline anonymissimus

  • Sergeant
  • *****
  • Posts: 347
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #3 on: August 29, 2014, 04:23:17 pm »
picture of map would help...
It takes 30 secs to open a game in skirmish mode as I told you the exact name it has.

Offline Noordung

  • Squad Leader
  • ****
  • Posts: 285
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #4 on: August 29, 2014, 04:27:06 pm »
it takes more than 30 sec... didnt know you can play it on skirmish.

Offline anonymissimus

  • Sergeant
  • *****
  • Posts: 347
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #5 on: August 30, 2014, 09:20:51 pm »
Yep, I remember that map. Well, it's pure luck and rush map. Yes, few times I was able to save more than two civilians, but half of my squad was near to death, but I also did a lot of retries so I don't bother anymore to be successful civilian saver on that map.
And what if you force yourself to never retry or reload ? So no matter what the battle result is, you have to accept it ?

All maps from the campaign can be played in skirmish as well (apparently). It's just that the player visible names make it hard to identify the correct map.

Offline jcjordan

  • Squad Leader
  • ****
  • Posts: 138
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #6 on: September 02, 2014, 11:49:42 pm »
I remember this map & from what I've seen posted a few times - don't worry about saving the civies (as Capt Kirk says in ST The Undiscovered Country - Let them die) as you won't take a big a hit as you think if you let them die - took the same attitude on just about every map. Also I try to use smoke to cover my first turn moving my team on the steps/bridge on the far side from the playground & pick them off from a distance then worry about what aliens are in the far back of the map behind the buildings

Offline anonymissimus

  • Sergeant
  • *****
  • Posts: 347
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #7 on: September 03, 2014, 02:13:44 am »
you won't take a big a hit as you think if you let them die
It's annoying if you've already reached the maximum happiness. Once that one of those bad maps appears, all nations instantly fall below their funding maximum. Just because of one map, even though I usually safe many civilians. (There are 2 other maps where I loose most civilians most of the time, old mine and one of the port versions).
And it can have a great impact if you loose 6/8 civies on such a map early on, if the effect lasts until the next month change. And it actually continues, even if some other missions undid the damage.
« Last Edit: September 03, 2014, 02:16:01 am by anonymissimus »

Offline jcjordan

  • Squad Leader
  • ****
  • Posts: 138
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #8 on: September 03, 2014, 04:57:25 am »
I end up saving more civies than I lose but I just don't go out of my way to try to save them directly. I save them in essence by killing aliens from smoke cover as quickly as possible w/o losing my soldiers

Offline H-Hour

  • Administrator
  • PHALANX Commander
  • *****
  • Posts: 1923
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #9 on: September 03, 2014, 12:40:31 pm »
You may be interested in the comments on the Map Revision project in the wiki. The following comment appears under england:

Quote
This is a cool map, but the player start position is a real pain. Never get out of the bowl.

There are so many maps. And so many of them make for poor tactical combat. This project needs an army of mappers addressing this. But I believe ShipIt is the only one holding down the fort these days.

Offline Noordung

  • Squad Leader
  • ****
  • Posts: 285
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #10 on: September 03, 2014, 04:42:57 pm »
You may be interested in the comments on the Map Revision project in the wiki. The following comment appears under england:

There are so many maps. And so many of them make for poor tactical combat. This project needs an army of mappers addressing this. But I believe ShipIt is the only one holding down the fort these days.
yes but in windows i belive ufo radiant even doesnt work. tried and nothing happened. i know there were somo topics about ufo radiant, but it seems i cant find them...

Offline anonymissimus

  • Sergeant
  • *****
  • Posts: 347
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #11 on: September 03, 2014, 04:58:09 pm »
You may be interested in the comments on the Map Revision project in the wiki.
So, does this mean that all maps are supposed to allow for an increase in nation happiness, and that there are not just some meant to annoy the player ?

Offline ShipIt

  • Project Artist
  • Captain
  • ***
  • Posts: 906
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #12 on: September 03, 2014, 07:35:43 pm »
So, does this mean that all maps are supposed to allow for an increase in nation happiness, and that there are not just some meant to annoy the player ?

I think most maps were simply made for the game.

But I know about an exception. The "england" map was done just to annoy a certain player.

Offline anonymissimus

  • Sergeant
  • *****
  • Posts: 347
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #13 on: September 03, 2014, 09:17:46 pm »
The "england" map was done just to annoy a certain player.
Umm..lol.
Well, it's a serious question. Some maps could be intended to necessarily decrease nation happiness to make the game harder.
Or the development philosophy could (should) be that there are tactics so that all maps can be won without this happening.

Offline ShipIt

  • Project Artist
  • Captain
  • ***
  • Posts: 906
    • View Profile
Re: My worst map: small village (called "england" in skirmish)
« Reply #14 on: September 04, 2014, 08:46:18 pm »
Umm..lol.
... Some maps could be intended to necessarily decrease nation happiness to make the game harder...

Thats not the case.