Topics

1

Bugs in stable version (2.5) / [2.5_dev_13/01/19] Items dropped during battle are subject to autosell

« on: January 24, 2013, 09:37:04 pm »

If a soldier drops an item during battle that is marked as autosell and doesn't pick it back up again before the mission ends, that item is treated as dropped by the enemy and sold. This has happened to me with a plasma pistol which I dropped in order to use a medikit. Soldier equipment that was brought into the mission should be excluded from being sold automatically upon the end of the mission.

(A post has been made on the bug tracker regarding this bug.)

2

Feature Requests / Have TU be visible on the soldier status / equip screens

« on: January 22, 2013, 02:51:31 pm »

TU is a vital statistic - everyone who has actually played a battle instead of clicking 'auto mission' would probably agree. And yet there is currently no way to see how many TUs your soldier gets per turn until you actually take him/her into battle. I suggest making TUs visible in the personnel / equip screens.

Alternatively, you could make the mouseover in the equip screen more elaborate - show total TUs there and then break down how the game arrived at that number: base TUs, bonus from speed, bonus/penalty from encumbrance/whatever else is applicable.

If the latter solution is preferred, I'd still like to be able to see the TUs a new hireling will get with his speed stat, but that could be done via mouseover on the speed stat.

(Should I just continue cross-posting bugs and improvement ideas straight to the trackers, or I should I wait for them to be vetted here first? What about really minor things, like the suggestion to call 'Reloading time' on aircraft weapons 'Fire rate' or something to that effect? (To me, it was not clear what 'Reloading time' meant until I realized that reloading weapons at a base doesn't actually take any time at all...))


Quizer

3

Feature Requests / Left click should work on mouse button release, not mouse down

« on: January 22, 2013, 02:10:55 pm »

When doing a left click, the moment when the mouse button released is the one that should count. At the moment, this is true for the time UI actions are executed, but not for the click location. If you click somewhere, drag the mouse over another UI element and release it, it will execute the first element. I feel it should execute the second element instead so it becomes possible to correct yourself if you misclick, or at the very least cancel the action.

I was also going to suggest left-click then right-click without releasing to cancel actions, but it seems this is already implemented (though I have not checked everywhere).

I've posted this to the feature request tracker, but if others feel differently about this issue, feel free to chime in.

4

Bugs in stable version (2.5) / [2.5_dev_13/01/19] Crash to geoscape from battle - inventory mismanagement by AI

« on: January 21, 2013, 01:31:52 pm »

The game suddenly crashed to the geosphere while the enemy turn was going on. A few soldiers were killed and Gilliam panicked, then was killed. I guess the game didn't know what to do with the grenade he was holding in his off-hand, for whatever reason.

Here is the relevant bit of the ufoconsole log:

Code: [Select]

2013/01/21 13:18:47 Quizer has taken control over team 1.
2013/01/21 13:20:11 [STATS] Quizer (Ewan) kills alien (Akrokk Tt Treknk) with Aimed Shot of sniper_ammo (entnum: 55)
2013/01/21 13:20:32 Soldier entered the rescue zone.
2013/01/21 13:20:32 Soldier left the rescue zone.
2013/01/21 13:21:33 Soldier left the rescue zone.
2013/01/21 13:21:54 Soldier left the rescue zone.
2013/01/21 13:22:00 Team 1 ended round
2013/01/21 13:22:00 Team 7's round started!
2013/01/21 13:22:00 [STATS] Mnookk Kkr Kraukk is bleeding (damage: 9)
2013/01/21 13:22:00 [STATS]  (Mnookk Kkr Kraukk) was killed (entnum: 54)
2013/01/21 13:22:01 [STATS] alien (Rniuk Kr Zrrosk) kills Quizer (Forde) with Ball of plasblaster_ammo (entnum: 59)
2013/01/21 13:22:07 Gilliam panics!
2013/01/21 13:22:07 [STATS] Gilliam is bleeding (damage: 8)
2013/01/21 13:22:07 [STATS] Gilliam panics (entnum 61).
2013/01/21 13:22:07 [STATS] alien (Kraerak Sk Trevuk) kills Quizer (Gilliam) with Snap Shot of plasrifle_ammo (entnum: 61)
2013/01/21 13:22:07 ********************
2013/01/21 13:22:07 ERROR: InvAdd failed - could not add 1 item(s) of fraggrenade to container 2
2013/01/21 13:22:07 ********************
2013/01/21 13:22:07 Shutdown server: Server crashed
I doubt this can be easily reproduced, but here's the savegame with the mission where this happened anyway.

5

Bugs in stable version (2.5) / [Not a bug] [2.5_dev_13/01/19] Unable to take down any base buildings

« on: January 21, 2013, 05:04:53 am »

See attached savegame. In the South Asia base, I'm unable to take down any base buildings. No matter which one I right-click, it says it's the only connection to other buildings and I can't take it down.

I edited this base in the savefile, changing the location of the entrance. Could that have something to do with it?

6

Feature Requests / Nation colors in statistics screen should be the same as in geosphere

« on: January 21, 2013, 04:31:57 am »

At the moment, the colors for the funding graph in the statistics screen seem to be random. I think they should be the same colors that are used for the nation border view in the geosphere. Consistency and all that.

I'm pretty sure I've seen parameters for the geosphere colors in the .ufo files somewhere, but are the graph colors there, too? I'd rather the latter be changed.

7

Feature Requests / Show UFO number in event log

« on: January 21, 2013, 03:42:34 am »

At the moment, it always says "Our radar detected a new UFO near [base]". I think it would be nice if the UFO number the game assigns to it was shown in brackets here, since UFOs that you have seen before do get their old number back. That way, you could check back and verify whether you've seen that particular UFO before or not.

Also, maybe it should say "Our radar reacquired a previously detected UFO near [base]" instead when you've already seen that UFO.

8

Feature Requests / Time speed settings: adjacent 1 hr/s and 12 hr/s settings too far apart

« on: January 21, 2013, 03:30:17 am »

Often, I find myself requiring a time setting between the ones of '1 hour' and '12 hours'. I get impatient using the 1 hour setting, but at the 12 hour setting, the ticks are too far apart and game behavior such as UFO pathing and completion of construction, production and research becomes erratic, which I'd rather avoid. Also, there's not much call to have 12 hours and 1 day time settings both - the difference is only a factor of 2, while the previous jump is a factor of 12.

Long story short, I think the '12 hours' setting should be changed to 4 hours or 6 hours per second.

Failing that, I'd like to mod those time settings for my own use. Is this possible with scripts?

9

Feature Requests / "In Use" column in buy/sell and production screens

« on: January 21, 2013, 03:21:15 am »

I'd like if there was a way to see how many items (total AND available) of each there are in the base, including those currently equipped on soldiers or aircraft. I hate looking at the buy screen and wondering how many grenades I should buy because the screen lists some numbers, but doesn't tell me how many are currently equipped on my soldiers. So I need to go to the soldier equip screen and check, go back to the buy screen to stock up, then go back to the aircraft screen to see how much ammo I have left... *yawn*

All this running back and forth could be avoided if there was an additional column in the item screens (both buy/sell and production), labeled either 'available' or 'in use'. Please consider including something along those lines.


Quizer

10

Bugs in stable version (2.5) / [2.5_dev_13/01/19] People die before they are killed

« on: January 21, 2013, 12:33:46 am »

When your soldier is killed by a shot from far away, he gurgles and keels over before the shot actually hits him. In this specific case, I've observed hovernet shots do this, but I'm pretty sure it could be any kind of shot.

Attached is a savegame with a Hydroelectric Dam mission, where this effect shouldn't be hard to reproduce - just line most of the soldiers up near the fence and wait for enemies at the far end to snipe them.

11

Newbie Coding / Text improvements

« on: January 20, 2013, 08:51:11 pm »

I'd like to help out by cleaning up typos, grammatical errors and possibly stylistic imperfections in the various texts in the game, such as UFOpaedia entries, research mails and tip of the day entries, and so on. I'm pretty good at detecting those things, so I thought this could be a good way to contribute to the project that is also convenient for me.

I'm pretty clear on where to find most of those texts, but how/where do I submit the changes? Should I just upload the 'fixed' files to a forum thread here and let someone else take care of getting it included in the game, or is there a better way? Please let me know.


Quizer

12

User modifications / [MOD] Easy Radar Rangefinder

« on: January 20, 2013, 07:51:35 pm »

I made this mod to make it easier to see the radar range of a prospective base and optimize radar coverage. This mod lets you build a new base and immediately add either kind of radar (or both), without having to wait days for stuff to build while having to deal with UFOs.


This mod encompasses the following changes:

 - Radar and Advanced Radar base buildings no longer require the command center to work
 - Advanced Radar no longer requires Alien Detection to be researched to be built (it still requires its own tech, however, which is unlocked when you research Alien Detection)

 - Build time for Radar and Advanced Radar base buildings set to zero days
 - Build price for the above base buildings decreased by a factor of 100
 - Build price for a new base decreased by a factor of 100 (for all campaign difficulties)

 - Build time for Radar Tower installation set to zero days (the game only checks build progress at midnight, though)
 - Build price for Radar Tower installation decreased by a factor of 100

 - If you start a new game, you can build Advanced Radar immediately (Advanced Radar tech added to 'already researched at start of game' list - does not affect existing savegames)



Hopefully someone other than me will get some use out of this. Enjoy!



Questions for more experienced coders / scripters:

 - I've tried using the 'mandatory' flag to cause the game to build the radar and its prerequisites automatically when building a new base, but the game crashed on me when I selected 'Campaign' in the main menu when I did this. Can 'mandatory' be true for one building only?

 - I'd like to make Advanced Radar available in the build list of any savegame that is loaded with this mod active, without messing with what is already researched and what is not. At the moment, a new game started with this mod has the tech unlocked, a change which persists even after the game is loaded without the mod.

13

User modifications / Unbuildable squares

« on: January 20, 2013, 05:55:55 pm »

I've been looking for the parameters for those unbuildable squares, for example the ones that control their occurrence rate or their max number, or the function that creates them when you build a new base. Where are these things hidden?

14

Bugs in stable version (2.5) / [2.5_dev_13/01/19] "You've got mail" flag not reset properly when loading game

« on: January 20, 2013, 01:24:27 pm »

When you receive unopened mail (when finishing a research topic, for example), the "mail client" button on the geoscape screen starts blinking. However, sometimes when loading a game back to an earlier point of time where I have no mail I haven't already seen, that button is still blinking.

I've attached a savegame. Progress time until the current research project "UFO Theory" finishes, then load the game without looking at the new mails. When I do that, the "mail client" button still blinks, even though it shouldn't.

15

Bugs in stable version (2.5) / [2.5_dev_13/01/19] Aircraft radar unable to find mission on ground

« on: January 20, 2013, 11:42:55 am »

During campaign play I suddenly found my approval rating in Asia drop at the end of day (00:00), which made me conclude I'd missed some terror mission or something in Asia, where I have no radar installations. So I load up my save from a day earlier and send my 2 interceptors and my dropship to scour the entire Asian continent for a ground-based mission. However, no matter how much I sweep the area, my ships never find anything.

In the meantime, I've created a small mod that makes it cheaper to build new bases and radar installations and causes them to build instantly, to let me experiment with base placement more easily and figure out the base locations that give me optimal coverage. So, by this point I'm wondering whether I'm just to dumb to search the right areas or whether the mission is somewhere else in the world and the approval rating for Asia is just collateral damage, so I load up my mod and drop a radar base on Asia.

And voila, it instantly discovers a ground mission at the extreme southern edge of the asian mainland. So I load up my regular, unmodded game again and send my planes over there. But for some reason, no matter how many hours they spend hovering or flying over that spot, they never find the mission. For some reason, only a ground-based radar installation (base or tower) is able to find the mission.

Is this intentional? I thought sending planes to sweep areas outside your radar range was to be a valid gameplay tactic. But if the aircraft can't discover missions on the ground, that puts a bit of a damper on that idea.