do explosions travel thorugh walls

[talon]

i'm often having the problem where a alien is standing just beside the door , my shooters can not seem him so i wanted to ask if i drop a grenade next to the wall or detonate a rocket against that wall near the door will it go through and kill the alien


Explosion
wall                  wall
_______   Door _______

Alien

[talon]

i know its really hard to program into the game
 but its times like this i really miss blowing apart a wall and then sniping the alien behind it

[Edi]

No it won't. Walls are impenetrable, but if you throw a grenade just inside the door, the alien takes the full brunt of the blast.

[talon]

Thanks for the reply Edi

i remember hearing something in the tip of the day
about changing the height level when using the rockets

is it possible to actually target the floor just inside the door

[Edi]

Yes.

Close doesn't count. Unless you're using high explosives, of course...

[talon]

do you have to do something special

hold shift or something to target the floor

[Edi]

No. Just target that square and the soldier will fire at it.

[Brasher]

Just tap the shift button and it will cycle through floor, mid-level and above head on the selected floor lvl.  Works like a charm for grenade launchers, you can air burst their heads right over fences and hedges.  As for destructable terrain, I hope one day some one implements that, it used to be a major tactic for me in the old X-COM series.  Another tip: if there is doors, use 'em.  hitting backspace near a door allows for open/closing (1 Time Unit).  I had fun on an industrial level where a building had a door not far from the doors of a harvester and I had both flanks covered by the rest of my squad while my main character stood in front of the door. Open, fire, close, next turn, repeat and they dont seem to get a clue lol.  Always pack medkits on all your troops.  None of mine die this way, with them in pairs healing each other.

[Eaun]

maybe i read (or dreamt i read) a long time ago that current engine does not allow for destructable walls. Or at least the devs didnt knew how to. Thinking the quote was similar to "If you can manage to make -this game engine- do that, be my guest"

Besides, You are an eco friendly Phalanx Unit! you recycle, use public transport, and mantain Private Property Walls unharmed. Also, you dont splatter the guts of aliens in front of children.

Speaking of which. The game needs more half sized civilians that run a lot, are a harder-to-hit-target, and will run into your soldier's LOS at every given chance. I mean those little human vermin known as Kids.

[Destructavator]

Speaking of which. The game needs more half sized civilians that run a lot, are a harder-to-hit-target, and will run into your soldier's LOS at every given chance. I mean those little human vermin known as Kids.

VERY true.  IMO we could use a lot of new civ models, of all ages, that fit the game's setting (about 80 years in the future) better.

Hmmm...   I think the next time I have more spare time on my hands, I just might model a few.  Yes, I think I'd like to try that.

[keybounce]

maybe i read (or dreamt i read) a long time ago that current engine does not allow for destructable walls. Or at least the devs didnt knew how to. Thinking the quote was similar to "If you can manage to make -this game engine- do that, be my guest"

Besides, You are an eco friendly Phalanx Unit! you recycle, use public transport, and mantain Private Property Walls unharmed. Also, you dont splatter the guts of aliens in front of children.

So, we have high explosives, blasters, and yet the tents are left undamaged. No property loss.

It's the exact opposite of comic books, where buildings collapse and no one gets hurt :-)

[Destructavator]

It's too bad that with explosions we don't have the "chunky salsa" effect in the game.  That would be nice, though it would take a bit of coding work to implement, having to check all nearby surfaces and such.

[Flying Steel]

i'm often having the problem where a alien is standing just beside the door , my shooters can not seem him so i wanted to ask if i drop a grenade next to the wall or detonate a rocket against that wall near the door will it go through and kill the alien

Your high explosives will not kill aliens hiding directly behind a wall, but they SHOULD. This should be a feature of explosive weapons, to compensate for the huge hole in gameplay balance that is the lack of destructible environments (which in turn are only there due to significant technical challenges of implementing them in the near term, not as a matter of balance design, if I am not mistaken).

It should be made a feature that explosive blasts cause some degree of damage directly through a wall, perhaps even full damage through walls not thicker than 1 tile. Because a big part of modern day infantry rocket launchers is to demolish defensive hold outs like bunkers, if the enemy insists on not relocating or counter attacking (which the aliens often don't, they simply take pot shots from their structure).

It's a vital counter to camping in many situations that's currently missing form the game, even though it would be no where near as difficult to implement as destructible environments and would thus make an excellent interim solution.

As a side benefit, the rocket launcher which is strangely about twice as accurate as the sniper rifle and almost entirely more useful, could have a more reasonable balance and realistic role if one of its primary abilities/advantages was to kill held up enemies that most weapons couldn't touch (without getting very, very close).

I would even say that to further counter structure camping in maps with sparse cover for advancing grenadiers, the high velocity electromagnetic accelerators- the railguns, coilguns and particle beams, should penetrate right though walls that are not more than one tile thick.

Then clearing a building, with one camping alien with a particle beam, where there isn't sufficient cover for a grenadier or CQC specialist to close the distance, wouldn't necessarily cost so many lives. And the aliens could and should use the same advantage against you, so that you can't always get away with simple and extended camping strategies either.

[H-Hour]

Even if you could shoot a coilgun through a wall, how would you aim it?

I disagree that the lack of damage through walls or destructable terrain is a hole in the gameplay. Being able to blow through every wall actually reduces the tactical complexity of the built environment to a very one-strategy game. This may change somewhat, however, when a visibility system is introduced to the game.

[Soul]

I guess it would make sense if it was impossible to destroy walls in UFOs (because it would require too powerful explosives that could destroy everything around the ship).