Messages

31

Tactics / Re: Where/why/how many bases do you build?

« on: January 17, 2013, 07:04:29 pm »

thought of making a second attempt at the radar coverage from a bit earlier save than the last, but noticed the previous radar coverage didn't really have a gap over greenland, so the base placement is all solid.

@krilain: you might want to take a look at the real financing in the statistics, and you will certainly notice what you might want to cover first, and it will probably not be north america.
can't go wrong with covering your greatest credits source first.

32

Tactics / Re: Where/why/how many bases do you build?

« on: January 13, 2013, 02:21:22 pm »

discovered i had a save from before building the last two bases, so maybe i will do an improved version of the same thing.

does anyone know if multiple radars in the same base will improve the detection rate?

@ Sarin:
a screenshot of the result, maybe?
otherwise i would need to play the game to see what it really looks like.

while at it, is there a way to remove the hud from the screenshot, so that the whole map could be displayed?
i vaguely remember there might have been such thing, but couldn't find it.

maybe i am wrong, but i feel like the installations have other uses than being radar towers.
1) i want most bases to have an ufo yard.
because i find it reasonable to dismantle ufo-s in bases with antimatter consuming crafts, for convenience (using saracens with particle beam for most ufo-s, and a dragon being the third interceptor for tougher fights).
maybe that is partly because i don't know if and how fast spinners work in 2.5.
2) i want ufo dumps on small islands, meaning about 4 sam sites at one spot, dropping ufo-s into the sea.

33

Discussion / Re: dragging weapons in battlescape?

« on: January 13, 2013, 02:03:07 pm »

if all items would be throwable, then you could substitute the medkit with the almighty plasma pistol.

anyway, it was intended as a half joke rather than a serious proposal, because it is a half-baked solution to an inherent problem in turn-based games.

34

Feature Requests / Re: Grenade launcher, its ammo and article

« on: January 12, 2013, 10:42:20 pm »

if they have better explosives then are the hand grenades also smaller and lighter in ufo:ai?

Reminds me of this adult's joke where instead of being respectful and polite, a contemptuous guy quotes something that hasn't been said and still gets it wrong.

btw, where exactly did i get it wrong? would not have posted if i hadn't known it is plasma burst, to begin with.

35

Discussion / Re: dragging weapons in battlescape?

« on: January 12, 2013, 10:34:51 pm »

ha, and what about assigning time to items that are subject to such actions (not only throwing).
so that one medkit cannot travel around the battlescape healing everyone in one turn.
if one soldier drops medkit at 10% TU, another soldier cannot see (and pick up) the medkit before reaching 10% TU or less.
ok, that would be complicated, but wicked.
: )

36

Tactics / Re: Where/why/how many bases do you build?

« on: January 12, 2013, 10:23:31 pm »

tried to get full and continuous land coverage with 7 bases and failed.
the gap over greenland was not intended.
should have built the north american base a bit more to the east.

edit: looked at it again, and it seems my eyes were playing tricks on me previously, and the continous radar coverage in this screenshot was ok (the thing that looked like a gap over greenland is the outer radar range circles).

the point of continuous radar coverage was not loosing sight of an ufo that has been spotted (except over pacific).

37

Coding / Re: Formula for TU penalty

« on: January 10, 2013, 11:36:39 am »

or picking up a medkit - and not be able to use it in the next turn

at this i thought: you would need to drop something then, to use the medkit.
but if TU is calculated from weight at the beginning of turn only, then you are out of luck next turn.
unless you knew that you would not have enough TU to use the medkit the next turn and knew you needed to drop something this turn.

and then, if you dropped your heavy weapon at the end of each turn and picked it up at the start of turn, would it give you more usable TU (i mean more than needed for dropping and picking up)?
for example, if you needed to dash from one cover to the next cover.

i see, instant TU effects could be fragile.

would be nice if the GUI also displayed max TU at the current weight.
or listed max TU at all encumbrance levels in the case of those hard caps like they are now.

38

Coding / Re: Formula for TU penalty

« on: January 10, 2013, 09:44:46 am »

with a smooth (continuous) encumbrance % the GUI could just show the encumbrance %, and the formula could even be nonlinear (say, TU starts to drop noticeably at 50% something).
clearly it would be more simple in the GUI, and (i am not sure) it could also be more intuitive.

with discrete encumbrance levels you force the player to not go as light as makes sense, but to fill some artificial threshold.
and there would be funny situations like picking up an ammo clip in the battlefield caused TU to drop 20%.

on a side note,

Exponentiation: initialSkill + (experience / 100)^0.6

makes me think why exponent when there are nice formulas of type

x / (x + const)

that have a better curve and also make at least as much sense theoretically.

39

Feature Requests / Re: Grenade launcher, its ammo and article

« on: January 10, 2013, 08:52:32 am »

particle beam grenades don't make sense.

doesn't matter if it makes sense or not, the association is still quite strong once particle beam becomes the main weapon.

i see it as a case of naming the plasma grenades before particle beam was discovered, and the name PB being used for historical reasons.

40

Discussion / Re: dragging weapons in battlescape?

« on: January 09, 2013, 10:25:23 pm »

no, as far as i remember, you couldn't hit with anything in x-com, so it must have been throwing.

unless you saw it in your dreams, because i don't remember a thrown grenade doing any damage before explosion, nor a soldier getting damage from anything thrown.

41

Feature Requests / Re: Grenade launcher, its ammo and article

« on: January 09, 2013, 10:20:41 pm »

reminds me of this children's joke:
1) say 'particle beam' ten times.
2) what are PB grenades?

edit: i think i understood why people got confused in the subsequent posts, therfore some explanation might be needed here (and please consider that this edit was not here at the time the responses were posted, so no need to judge these posters by that).
the original children's joke goes like this:
1) say 'new york' ten times.
2) what is the capital of usa?
and even if people know what the capital really is, after saying 'new york' ten times there is a chance they will answer 'new york'.
which would produce the response:
3) really?
meaning that when particle beam is the main weapon, PB is easier to associate with particle beam rather than plasma burst.
the alternative and considerably more wicked adults joke could certainly be:
1) say 'washington' ten times.
2) what is the capital of usa?
wicked because the other person would have no chance not to look stupid.
adults joke because children would rather have the other person answer wrong.

42

Discussion / Re: dragging weapons in battlescape?

« on: January 09, 2013, 09:58:16 pm »

@kurja:
yeah, and you could also hit an alien with anything in melee, and the heavier the item the more the damage (so it wouldn't make sense to beat the alien with ir-goggles) and some items would have special melee damage.

i mean, like with a grenade launcher.
if the damage is enough then the grenadier wouldn't need a secondary weapon (especially considering that monomolecular knife (as a secondary weapon) is so difficult to put in belt or holster (you need to drag it extremely accurately, unlike other items)).

btw did you manage to kill any alien in x-com by throwing your out of ammo heavy plasma at it?

@DarkRain:
and stun rods.

43

Discussion / Re: Encourgment to the team

« on: January 09, 2013, 09:54:59 am »

my best guess is: give feedback, and try to script the pilot stats display at the screen where the pilot is assigned to craft.

44

Discussion / Re: dragging weapons in battlescape?

« on: January 09, 2013, 09:51:54 am »

the weapon in hud-s is container, just like the weapon hand in the inventory screen.
just the hud designer did not make the container a ghost (ignores mouse gestures).
this is not really a flaw, as you cannot drop it anywhere else than the hand in battlescape anyway (though maybe you can put it in the other hand if it is not a two-handed weapon).

*cough* there is a user mod hud that lets the drag do something useful in battlescape (no throwing by dragging, though, throwing is one of the actions (listed among firemodes) that you can do with only some items like medkits and ir-goggles).

45

Feature Requests / Re: Base Improvements

« on: December 15, 2012, 11:08:29 pm »

true, the phalanx bases are pathetic, but aliens who are trying to invade are even more pathetic.

if the aliens are supposed to have any chance at all, i guess they should create a breach somewhere with bombardment from the ufo (some broken terrain and building models needed), and then use some nice things like poison gas and smoke (and ir-goggles to see through the smoke except for the shevaar who see infrared anyway and should therefore not be affected by smoke), and grenades with some shockwave.
but then players will probably ask for gas masks for the soldiers, and corridors with armored mechanical machine guns that aren't affected by such cheap tricks at all, and from the top of my incompetent civilian head, i don't seem to have a good idea how the aliens could ever invade such base.

i wonder how effective even an ordinary CH₄ gas cylinder (open), tossed into a room and thereafter ignited, would be at clearing out a room in the current phalanx base?