Messages

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 19, 2010, 10:21:20 pm »

Thats very disappointing news indeed, i was really hoping that the 2.3 full release would have sorted out the problem guess gonna have to shelve my plans to have a good crack at it for a while yet as i just cant cope with the rage inducing stupidity of it. I would also really like to know how to reactivate the old system, ive tried everything people have said but it doesnt seem to work no matter what i do.

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 19, 2010, 08:22:29 pm »

Am very exited about 2.3 release and lookin forward to havin a crack (aint had time to sit down and play yet), got my fingers crossed that RF actually works now and i can actually enjoy the game. To be honest i dont really care what system is used as long as its reliable, thats pretty much the key for me. I need to know that when i cover a door that its covered.

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Discussion / Re: Weapon Ideas?

« on: June 13, 2010, 10:44:51 pm »

Id like to see more human based weapons trees to explore based of backwards engineering alien tech, instead of just normal weapons -----> Laser ------> Plasma maybe some branching tech trees to explore and specialized directions to go in such as sniper weapons, heavy, explosive ect....

The tech tree is a bit linear as it is you just follow a set path and get everything.

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 13, 2010, 08:55:00 pm »

My only problem with the 2.2 system was the use of the following turns TUs instead of the reserved TUs which seemed illogical to me, buy hey at least it was reliable. As for recoil that shouldn't even be an issue, why would recoil happen for RF and not for normal firing? As far as im concerned the technicalities of weapon firing are taken into account with the soldiers stats and his chance to hit just as it is.

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Discussion / Re: Production for profit

« on: June 13, 2010, 07:59:29 pm »

I don't really see PHALANX or XCOM as being mercenaries, there special forces funded by the UN not a group of guns for hire.

I do agree that you should earn a profit on what you produce but on the flip side i dont think its realistic that a government armed force would get its funding by producing and selling weapons so i see why the developers try to make that a non option. I realize armies of the world sell of there surplus equipment sometimes but its is certainly not there primary income. Some system of negotiating deals with governments to supply there armies with certain weapons could be nice but im not sure how it would be implemented.

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 13, 2010, 07:09:01 pm »

Alright, so basically the whole system that delays a soldier's shot by the TUs necessary to use the firemode needs to go, if I've understood the above correctly.

I don't think shots should be instantaneous, though. There should be SOME delay that prevents soldiers from taking shots at enemies that are only briefly visible (e.g. only for one step before vanishing again). Ideas?

My whole problem is that RF needs to be reliable, if i set soldiers up covering a doorway or corner i need to know that the area is covered and the aliens cant just waltz around it without challenge. There are many squad based games like UFO you can draw inspiration from and as Brasher pointed out the system in the original was just fine but if you want an original idea ill quote myself from earlier in the thread...

I think the TUs of the victim shouldn't even be a factor, what im gonna propose is basically your soldier goes into RF mode and readies his gun looking down the sights. This action will tighten his field of vision considerably, more so for scoped weapons such as sniper rifles, and any enemy walking into his field of vision becomes a target for RF which should be reliable. If people still think RF setting of immediately is to powerful then perhaps have a % chance of it procing very low when the victim enters LoS but rising very fast for every action taken say 10% when he enters LoS 25% if he takes a second step still in LoS 50% for a 3rd step 80% for a 4th and 100% for the 5th. This would give someone walking around a corner and encountering an enemy a chance to quickly duck back behind cover before being cut to pieces, attempting to shoot at someone set up ready with RF while in there LoS should proc it however. I think this would make it possible to not get totally cut to shreds by folks with RF but also avoid the madness of an alien walking around a corner right in front of 4 men with RF shooting 2 of them then walking away without even being attacked.

The idea that you have to use the same amount of TUs as someone set up covering an area before he will react is insane and quite obviously doesn't work, in games like this RF is the primary method of killing your opposition as it should be. Soldiers don't run and gun in real life they move into cover and shoot while there friends move into cover then shoot and vice versa. What would also be nice but probably a lot more difficult in terms of coding is taking control of the RF when it triggers and picking your target (limited to those in your direct LoS) and shot type. Any problems with certain weapons being overpowered in RF can be easily solved with tweeks and balancing of the specific weapons and there TU cost.

Something like that might just be the best of both worlds as you would have a chance to run back into cover upon stumbling on some aliens set up to fire (A visual que that someone is on RF would be nice such as them having there weapon raised ready to fire) but you could also rely on your men covering an area. The % chance to proc the RF could obviously be modified by various stats allowing someone with high speed to maybe be able to run from cover to cover past people with RF without being shot up to much. I do think you should only be able to shoot people u can directly see when you RF but i appreciate my ideas about fields of vision ect probably take a lot more coding than i can appreciate.

On an unrelated note as ive been playing further into the game there's a couple more small suggestions id like to make since a phalanx commander seems to be reading this now . The manufacturing system could use a little work, id like it to be similar to the research screen where u can assign your available workers to various projects running at the same time (amount of simultaneous projects could be limited to the amount of workshops in base perhaps). Also training facilities for troops/pilots (pilot stats/leveling would be great) would be great with different facilities for different stats, the idea of setting up a training base to train up fresh soldiers before moving them to your front line bases could be fun. Medical upgrades from alien tech would also be nice to speed up soldier recovery and also moar weapons! specifically in the sniper category, ive played quite far now and all my guys have got nice upgraded plasma type shenanigans to shoot with but the snipers are stuck with the starting sniper rifle.

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 09, 2010, 12:02:57 am »

Did seem a tad odd

I strongly feel it should be impossible regardless of weapons involved to walk in front of someone who is set up with RF and take a shot without being shot first, the person on RF is ready the alien wandering around the corner is not. As it stands we have situations where 4 soldiers are knelt covering a door and an enemy can walk into the opening, take aim, fire and then get back under cover. No one will ever convince me this is possible even with a pistol vs a machine gun.

except that, afaik, the evil devs want to motivate players to use as low tu shots for reaction fire as possible.

I don't have a huge problem with this, being limited to snap shots or 5 round bursts on machine guns would be fine as long as you can at least rely on your RF troops to do something.

I know i must sound like a broken record but i do strongly urge people to look into other turn based/squad based games and you will see that reaction fire is not over powered and any problems are simply balance issues for individual weapons. In Jagged Alliance 2 for example when you soldier gets an interrupt he can perform any action at all that he still has action points to perform including throwing grenades, dropping prone or running away. The idea that this is over powered is kinda laughable when you consider it is one of the hardest games i have played, its also worth playing simply cause its a great game

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 08, 2010, 11:41:40 pm »

I think you mistake me slightly, when i say reduces line of sight i don't mean the range is reduced but the angle. Imagine a cone going out from the point in front of the soldier which is his field of fire, he should only be able to target foes within this cone when he is reaction firing.

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 08, 2010, 04:14:01 am »

I think the TUs of the victim shouldn't even be a factor, what im gonna propose is basically your soldier goes into RF mode and readies his gun looking down the sights. This action will tighten his field of vision considerably, more so for scoped weapons such as sniper rifles, and any enemy walking into his field of vision becomes a target for RF which should be reliable. If people still think RF setting of immediately is to powerful then perhaps have a % chance of it procing very low when the victim enters LoS but rising very fast for every action taken say 10% when he enters LoS 25% if he takes a second step still in LoS 50% for a 3rd step 80% for a 4th and 100% for the 5th. This would give someone walking around a corner and encountering an enemy a chance to quickly duck back behind cover before being cut to pieces, attempting to shoot at someone set up ready with RF while in there LoS should proc it however. I think this would make it possible to not get totally cut to shreds by folks with RF but also avoid the madness of an alien walking around a corner right in front of 4 men with RF shooting 2 of them then walking away without even being attacked.

The idea that you have to use the same amount of TUs as someone set up covering an area before he will react is insane and quite obviously doesn't work, in games like this RF is the primary method of killing your opposition as it should be. Soldiers don't run and gun in real life they move into cover and shoot while there friends move into cover then shoot and vice versa. What would also be nice but probably a lot more difficult in terms of coding is taking control of the RF when it triggers and picking your target (limited to those in your direct LoS) and shot type. Any problems with certain weapons being overpowered in RF can be easily solved with tweeks and balancing of the specific weapons and there TU cost.

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 07, 2010, 08:13:45 pm »

Fair enough, i apologize if i seem abrasive because im genuinely impressed with the project but every time i play it in its current state i rage within 5 mins and feel like ranting somewhere . I just feel that some small tweeks to TU costs and Line of Sight ect from the 2.2 version would have been preferable than a complete new system but i guess thats a topic for elsewhere. Ill read through those links suggested by H-Hour and make a proposal of my own, which i know works and is balanced because its tried and tested elsewhere.

I still cant seem to get the fix to reset the system back to how it was in 2.2 to work however, no matter what i do my men VERY rarely RF yet the aliens have no problem at all which is contributing to the aforementioned rage problem so if one of you gents could help me with that id be grateful.

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 07, 2010, 06:44:17 pm »

So because snipers are over powered the solution is to utterly breakdown a fundamental mechanic of a squad based game instead of nerfing just the sniper? Did it not occur to anyone to make a sniper rifle take more TUs to fire perhaps, or dramatically tighten the snipers line of sight so his coverage on reaction fire isnt so great. Also, and i feel this is an important point... aliens SHOULD NOT be able to walk into the open in front of player with RF set up without being bloody shot at that is the very reason for reaction fire.

What you have just described is exactly the function of a sniper in games like this and real life for that matter, you put them in a good spot with good coverage and anyone who walks into there sights gets shot. That area is covered and instead of crying the enemy must work around it by trying to flank the position or using smoke grenades, the logic of totally breaking the game rather than snipers being powerful on a battlefield is insanity.

Most games like this when you activate Overwatch/Reaction Fire ect... the unit in question will spend some TUs to raise his gun and sit there ready to fire in the direction he is facing. This will limit his field of fire quite a bit so coming around the side is very possible, also sniper rifles should take considerably more TUs to fire than they do perhaps 16-18 for a snap shot and 22-24 for an aimed which would achieve the results your after without breaking the mechanic. Also letting you take direct control of reaction fire would be nice but importantly you wouldn't be able to move at all and you can only fire at what is directly in your line of fire.

This is a system that has worked very well for this type of game for as long time and does not need to be changed at all, if you want to nerf snipers be my guest but don't destroy an entire game mechanic to do it.

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 07, 2010, 02:06:27 am »

Simple is your men firing reserved TUs at enemy's when they enter there line of sight, that is completely fine and i don't understand why its been changed at all.

I agree that you shouldn't be able to attack anything that isnt in your LoS with reaction fire and i feel that you should only be able to do basic shots like snap shot other than that it should be immediate with no screwing about. As i said previously when you go into reaction fire mode you could also tighten up the characters LoS a little to represent him focusing down his sights to cover a specific area which would help balance it slightly aswell.

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 06, 2010, 08:45:00 pm »

Ahhh i put it in the C:\Program Files part so hopefully this will work thanks a bunch.

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 06, 2010, 06:30:28 pm »

If you wish to enable RF the way it was in 2.2.1, see here:

http://ufoai.ninex.info/forum/index.php?topic=4879.0

You might have noticed in my original post i mentioned that, said i couldn't get it to work and asked for help

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Discussion / Re: New to UFOAI have some questions / critisisms / suggestions

« on: June 06, 2010, 04:23:01 pm »

if i attempt to be really serious, then in my opinion a well thought out reaction fire system improves the game more than any storyline or new equipment or even equipment balance.

I agree and the system in the original XCOM games, Jagged Alliance Series, Fallout Series, Chaos Gate, Silent Storm and countless other truly great squad based combat games works just fine and does not need to be replaced by an overly complex system that doesn't work at all.

I'm not so sure RF is actual cover fire. Cover fire is usually done to keep the enemies heads dows and is exceptionally badly aimed. Reaction fire, on the other hand, is a method to make defensive play possible and make this seem more like actual combat (aka. real-time instead turn-based). Eg. a shot from shotgun when the alien has moved right in front of you is not exactly covering fire.

This is debatable but ive always seen reaction fire as cover fire translated into a turn based system as it serves the same purpose, you advance a few men while others sit with reaction fire on to cover that advance.

I haven't played JA2 so I don't have any opinions on that. However, the devs have said (a long time ago) that pure copying is not preferable.

Thats a shame but not entirely unexpected, JA is an unappreciated gem and if you like the XCOM games you owe it to yourself to give it a go. To me it is the finest example of a squad based combat game there is and like UFO blends a non linear over map with a squad based combat system to make something truly special. And i don't literally mean just rip it of completely but just use something that works from a game that does this kinda thing so so well, to quote my father "If its not broken don't fix it".

t's not only that the aliens can do that (walk, kill, go to safety). Assumed the RF has a "random" component this could happen (but it should only in rare cases).
Much more annoying IMO is the behaviour of "locking" a target.
The turn-based gameplay should somewhat simulate the action game. So it is logical that you can move a unit freely until it gets into LOS of an enemy - at this point RF comes into play. The enemy now gets a chance to fire at the spotted moved unit.

I agree 100% and in most of the games mentioned in my post this is exactly how it works, a unit using RF should only be able to shoot at what is in his direct line of fire.