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Author Topic: Struggling not to fail  (Read 4198 times)

Offline MRstinkyweasle

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Struggling not to fail
« on: January 27, 2013, 01:09:23 am »
So downloaded this yesterday and loving it. Tonight though, despite me thinking I was doing OK, I suddenly found myself being evicted from my base by the UN who were unhappy as i hadnt been doing enough to stop the aliens. This came as a shock as I had been pretty much destroying everything that came my way.

Is this an issue faced by many or just me? Saved game attached in case anyone can shed some light on it - most countries seem pretty happy with me!

Offline H-Hour

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Re: Struggling not to fail
« Reply #1 on: January 27, 2013, 01:39:55 am »
Are you playing on 2.4? Try searching the forums for nation happiness and keeping the nations happy. You'll probably find a lot of tips.

Particularly in the early game, you can get hid hard by UFOs outside of your radar range, so it's important to try to expand your radar and interceptor coverage as quickly as possible.

Offline Sarin

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Re: Struggling not to fail
« Reply #2 on: January 27, 2013, 02:00:41 am »
It takes just one country to screw you up, and russia and new africa are really unhappy with you.

Overall, you made some bad decisions about base layout. Too many aircraft, and you can't run effective research, manufacturing and interceptors/dropships in one base. I recommend running science in first base and workshops in secondary ones, that one starting workshop will do until you're able to build a new base. I never had the need to use more than one dropship and two interceptors per base, three bases in total.

Expanding your radar coverage early on with radar sites is a good solution, and build the second base as soon as possible. You will need to do some planning, so you better play one game just to the point where you get advanced radar so you know how much can it cover, then plan with it. Or if you want some layouts...I found that placing main base at east Crete, second in southeast Borneo, third somewhere in Texas, radar bases in south Africa, northeast Asia and south America works well. Also, get an UFO yard at once, put it near your future workshop base so you can disassemble UFOs quickly. I recommend capturing just one piece of any UFO, no matter what condition, and then capture just those that landed on their own, sell the rest. Only undamaged UFO will get you antimatter that you will need. Build SAM sites to add some extra protection to your bases, do not build them just somewhere in wilderness. They won't be able to shoot down any UFO on their own.

Filter out your soldier recruits. I see you are playing 2.4., so strength isn't important yet. I recommend keeping just those with speed and accuracy over 20 and mind near or over 30. You can right-click on a soldier's checkbox in recruitment screen to permanently get rid of him, some recruits are just that bad and you don't want them messing the screen.

Offline MRstinkyweasle

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Re: Struggling not to fail
« Reply #3 on: January 27, 2013, 06:07:47 pm »
Thanks for the replys - most of what I can find out basically says "Make sure you do the missions" which I have been really. First play through this and it just came as a big shock - I thought I was doing well (worst case was 3 countries are "neutral") and then get the letter dismissing me:)

Will have another go and revamp the bases. I did notice that my interceptors got knocked out pretty quickly - any tips on equipping them early on?

Offline kurja

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Re: Struggling not to fail
« Reply #4 on: January 27, 2013, 06:40:49 pm »
I eqip them with two sets of sparrowhawks and a shiva at the nose, plus ecm and a targeting computer on each craft. Before having built more advanced interceptor craft, I'd stay away from anything larger than a fighter - unless you can swarm it with at least 3 or more stilettos, or it has been already damaged by your sam sites / base defenses. If you want to take out those harvesters in early game, maybe it would be a good idea to use additional aircraft armour, I haven't tried that in current version though.

Offline homunculus

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Re: Struggling not to fail
« Reply #5 on: February 01, 2013, 09:39:51 pm »
I did notice that my interceptors got knocked out pretty quickly - any tips on equipping them early on?
if you are not attacking harvesters (those more triangular shaped bigger ones) you should be ok if you use the time arrow that looks like the play button on your media player (not fast forward).

at least this is what it looks like to me.
if that sounds absurd, you can think of game tick and fire rate messing up at higher game speeds.
not confirmed by devs, though.