base invasion on campaign

[RealSpirit]

for the 1st time i played campaign on the hardest mode available. until now it worked quite well, but now i've something to solve that i - up to now - cannot

i've got a base invasion by 8 enemies, nothin much of a problem so far. the issue is that after 3-4 turns it says:
"the alien forces reached their target zone".
several questions there:
- which actually IS their target zone? (building, level)?
- i thought that's something only existing in skirmish?
- does one have an own target (zone) despite killing all enemies? which is it?
- how many turns can pass at maximum after that text?

i tried to use google and the board based search, but either i used the wrong keywords or .... well.

system win 10
version 2.6/IA-32 20.jan.17 win32 debug it says

[DarkRain]

SPOILERS!! (Did you try to complete the mission already?)


Well IIRC there are up to to four objectives for the aliens: one outside and one inside of the power plant, one inside the antimatter storage and one inside the command centre.

But only the ones inside are victory conditions: once the aliens reach the inside of any of those buildings you have three turns to get there before the aliens either: overload your nuclear reactor, breach your antimatter containment (yes, either of those will blow up your base) or destroy your command centre (you'll lose the mission)

The other objective outside the power plant completes in two turns, and will grant the aliens access to your base by blowing up a hole in the wall.

You don't have a mission target in base defence missions, and even if you had wiping out the enemy means instant victory despite any objectives pending (the same applies to aliens)

[Damyen]

Hello. Moreover, you have some clues of what buildings you have to protect by reading the Ufopaedia (be careful thought: all you read is not true, because some "target zones" are still missing).

On the battlefield, each target zone is shown by a sort of green smoke (ex.: check the command, next to the video room, to see how it looks like).

[Damyen]

The other objective outside the power plant completes in two turns, and will grant the aliens access to your base by blowing up a hole in the wall.

And just a word about that: I think this makes base defence very easy. You just have to rush in the power plant with snipers, and shoot aliens through walls (sniper rifle, Bolter). As their main force rushes here, you kill about 3/4 of them with ease. Maybe changing the place of the "hot spot" creating the hole, or adding another few hot spots for blowing the wall could solve this issue.

[RealSpirit]

MUCH clearer now, thanks, really.

several questions arise from that:
i completed (or drove to near the end) several campaings and thus had several base attacks, each on lower difficutlies. i cant remember a time when i lost due to that target zone stuff. i cant even remember seeing a broken power plant wall and was quite surpised on that alternate entry.
i usually also restarted missions if aliens came close to my command center and the anti matter is usually placed within the safe base area, so i had no issues with that either.
could it be that these target zones, at least the outer one, appear to be there in higher difficulties only?

i found those green smoke areas and wondered what it is all about. well thanks, now i know.

the ufopedia.... well i remember reading it looong time ago. am playing ufo ai since about 2'13/2'14 from time to time. as i wrote: i never required more info.

thanks all, really helped.
now i just have to find out if it is enough that 1 alien is within that area after each of their turns or if it is required that one is in the area on the end of my turn too, and how close to the green smoke it is required. lots of questions.....

EDIT:
solved the problem with 1 dead cannon fodder to mourn.

while doing that fight i observed that the powerplant had a hole on the upper level already at turn 1, so nothing had been blown up. might be that's a bug in terms of what you wrote about it.

[Damyen]

Hello. There is a hole in the wall of the power plant, but it is really open when the alien have blown the wall (it's a "trick" to set the passage here: as the game engine doesn't allow materials to be destroyed, you have to create a "closed hole" that opens only after the aliens have openend it).

[DarkRain]

Mission objectives are a recent addition (aside from the fuel dump map) so it is possible the versions you were playing before had none.

The number of turns that a mission target has been occupied is counted at the start of the relevant team's turn

There is a bug (#5375) which causes breakable objects — like the breakable wall covering the hole in the power plant — to often appear invisible depending on certain conditions, the wall is there, but it is not rendered correctly, still, it will stop characters and weapons fire until it is broken, two turns after the aliens occupy the area just outside the hole.

[pe9298]

Playing 2.5, and having had 2 base attacks, I have not seen the hole in the wall.

If the potential hole in the wall is in a place the aliens cannot access, e.g. adjacent to an empty square, or limited by the external limit of the base, then I imagine the aliens cannot exploit it?

[DarkRain]

As I said, these all recent additions, I'm pretty sure the only mission objective in 2.5 was the breakable gate in the fueldump map, so no holes in power plants and no blowing up reactors, antimatter or command centres.

As for the hole itself: the above-ground walls of the power plant don't reach the map tile's border so even if the hole ends facing the edge of the map there will still be a walkable corridor for the aliens to reach it.