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Differences between Xenonauts and UFO:EU


Zombie

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I've been playing this game on and off for the last week, and am starting to notice some differences between Xeno & UFO:EU. So I thought I should start a topic about them.

 

First of all, if you send a dropship to a mission and your soldiers finish it, they don't have to come back to base between missions. If your ship has enough fuel and your crew is healthy enough, you can directly send them to another site nearby. All your ammo is restocked too, so you don't have to be skimpy on shots.This has some advantages as you can go to an area and clean up everything and head back to base when you're done. I'd recommend you have an interceptor (or two) nearby just in case the aliens retaliate and try to shoot down your dropship en route. rolleyes.gif

 

Secondly, ships seem to refuel/reload a lot faster than in UFO:EU. (Or maybe they don't and the time goes by quicker in Xeno)? I especially notice this with dropships as you can be out and about almost immediately after returning to base. Even with interceptors, they don't need to be at 100% fuel to send them out (weapon reloading is the limiting factor here).

 

Smoke Grenades. I mean what's the deal with it in Xeno? Smoke doesn't spread much, doesn't last long and some aliens see right through it. Is it worthwhile, because I haven't found a use for them yet. Stun Grenades and flashbangs on the other hand are a lot more useful. ;)

 

Tanks/vehicles seem to have more armor than in EU. I started to use them as bait which seems to work a lot of the time. Run them over to an alien to get their attention, then slowly creep back to lure them in. Where you lure the aliens to is dependent on where your soldiers are and the terrain. If you're in tight quarters, then lead the aliens back to your shield/assault (shotgun) or heavy weapons folks to shoot. If there is an open area, set some snipers up around the perimeter and take out the aliens from distance. As in X-COM try not to kill aliens with the tank. There have been instances where the aliens follow my tank and shoot at it from the rear and they either miss or hit and do little to no damage.

 

Countries get a lot more pi$$ed off at you for ignoring their section of the globe now. Gone are the days of getting enough points locally to impress countries globally. When you start out every country will cut funding except for (hopefully) the country your first base is in. Expect that to be a given. I guess the only way to circumvent this is to build bases ASAP to get as much radar coverage as you can.

 

So there's a few differences. These are the just the ones that pop out at me from recent memory. yes.gif

 

- Zombie

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Tanks also don't suffer in LoS at night. Economy is worse in Xenonauts, aliens use squad sight - this will get you pissed at late stage where you will be sniped from half the other map. High ranking aliens have Muton amount of health, the best alien weapon has enough armor mitigation making armor completely useless in terms of defense. The see through smoke probably was squad sight but anyway smoke reduces accuracy. I think it's 20% each tile ?
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Tanks also don't suffer in LoS at night.

 

Tanks have lights in Xeno, so yeah, makes sense. There were probably limitations in UFO preventing tanks from having lights, though I think there are bits in the game files which allow it.

 

Economy is worse in Xenonauts

 

Worse? It's basically nonexistent. And to me that makes it really bad as it eliminates another variable in strategy. Wealth acquisition in UFO was a priority as it meant you didn't have to rely on country funding. In Xeno you are stuck with the financing from countries and whatever else you can scrounge up from missions. Sure, it streamlines things as you aren't spending a lot of time selling stuff anymore, but it hurts strategy.

 

I should mention that I have finished Xenonauts already so it's not like this is my first time through the game or anything. It's just that the first time I completed the game I ignored the differences and played it assuming a clean slate (no prior knowledge). It takes some time getting used to but it isn't impossible. I did "cheat" a little bit at the end to figure out the final mission (YouTube videos helped).

 

Another thing I should mention is UFO placement in the Battlescape. In Xeno, the UFO is always placed on the West (or North, or North West) edge of the map - no exceptions. In UFO:EU the UFO could be anywhere, including smack-dab in the center of the map, right next to your dropship, or on an opposite corner. That made for a quicker/easier way to finish a mission sometimes. Speaking of dropships, in Xeno, the dropship is almost always on the opposite edge of the map from the UFO. This makes for stupidly-long missions as it forces you to trudge across the entire map every time. That's annoying! ;)

 

I suppose I should mention that in Xeno, you can't use the aliens weapons against them anymore. You can research them but the technology acquired leads to upgrades to your present weapons (for the most part). I do like that for some things (like thrown grenades and launched bombs from tanks or aircraft) they will be automatically upgraded when the research into a technology is finished which is a nice touch.

 

Another big difference is storage at a base. In UFO:EU you had to add more modules if you wanted more storage. In Xeno, you only need one it seems. And tanks need a garage now - they don't reside in the stores. I suppose that makes up for the fact that there's a new module now - the medbay which heals your soldiers faster. Unfortunately, soldiers get hurt - a lot - and your squad on a mission can still heal the injured, but only to a point. There's always going to be some small percentage of health which can't be fixed on the Battlescape (unlike in UFO:EU where you could fully patch up a soldier if the wounds were very minor). Stub your toe in Xeno and you're going to be visiting the medbay whether you like it or not. On the flip side of the coin though, your injured soldiers can still be sent on missions even though they aren't 100%. I find this isn't a really big plus as I usually end up swapping soldiers around quite a bit anyhow. Gotta train up those greenhorns somehow, so I send them out with a few vets in case they fail in critical situations. rolleyes.gif

 

- Zombie

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  • 2 weeks later...

You know, it's funny. The other day I was finishing up a crash site (and this is another big difference between Xeno and X-COM: in Xeno you are going to be dealing with 90-95% crash sites - UFO's refuse to land anymore) and there was one alien holed up in the ship with my team camped outside the main door. The thing would not budge, so I took my Hunter scout car off to the port (left) side of the craft and fired off a shot from it's pulse laser weapon against the hull hoping to rattle the thing. Only somehow the blast propagated through the UFO and took out the alien. That kinda surprised me as I thought explosives wouldn't do that.

 

As I said before, tanks are indispensable in Xeno. I've been using them for a variety of roles, but mostly they are for scouting and bullet magnets (not cannon fodder). I may even use them to destroy terrain (either by riding over it or blowing it up). Pretty useful things. The biggest thing I use them for is scouting. First thing during my round they will move until they spot an alien, then I'll try to take it out with my team. If nobody is in a decent position I'll withdraw the tank and move everyone around so that at least 2 have a shot. If the alien advances to shoot the tank, it'll get it. ;)

 

Soldier advancement seems to be a little easier than in X-COM. Maybe that's due to my playstyle (everyone on the mission gets a kill if possible). Even if someone doesn't get a kill, just shooting at an alien will usually improve multiple stats. And keeping everyone teetering on the brink of encumbered increases strength at least.

 

- Zombie

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  • 2 weeks later...

For the alien landing craft, the front door to the ship is big enough to get a tank inside which is useful for a couple reasons. First, the ground floor of the ship is littered with canisters and various alien junk which makes shooting aliens troublesome due to blockage but the tank can run over and destroy as much as you want. No junk=no blockage=clear shots. Secondly, you can roll a tank over one of the lifts to prevent any aliens from filtering down while your men are congregating. Once one group is in place, you can roll the tank over the other lift and get the second group in place. :)

 

The one item I haven't really found a use for (yet) is the Rocket Launcher. It's of course heavy, destroys valuable equipment/artifacts, can't reaction fire and suffers from any meaningful upgrades (like to the gun itself, not the shells). You can equip a tank with a rocket launcher (if you want) but it's bypassed quickly due to the Pulse Laser having explosive "shells". Explosives do not give much suppression either, and that's the name of the game early on. If you can suppress an alien, your men can fire at it without worry of drawing reaction fire. ;)

 

- Zombie

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I just ran into Wraiths (teleporting alien species) today (met them in my previous campaign but I killed them without capturing). So I knew the autopsy info but not an interrogation. Anyhow, I had a few men nearby to one I spotted, but nobody had enough time to use a baton so I did the next best thing: dump a stun grenade on it. But how to keep it from teleporting off? Well, I kept tossing flashbangs on it which suppresses it (reducing movement points by half preventing it from teleporting). It worked great. This afternoon I was looking at how others dealt with Wraiths and found out that Scott Manley (claim to fame is his Kerbel Space Program videos) did the same thing I did. Kinda cool. :P

 

I'm still having issues with base building strategy though. Because the financial aspect of the game is toned down I'm always worried I will not have enough money to build. So long story short, I probably end up waiting too long to expand (financial aspects aside, I prefer to build my bases so they have a compliment of soldiers to defend it, but soldiers take a long time to train up to decent levels). So I guess the strategy is to just build intercept bases and don't worry about losing it to the aliens if it is detected? This is the part I despise about Xenonauts: being pigeon-holed into a single strategy instead of the open feel of UFO:EU. wink.png

 

- Zombie

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  • 3 weeks later...

So it's been about 3 weeks since I last posted about Xenonauts. What has happened since then? Well, I've been playing almost every night, which usually includes two combat missions (sometimes more). I have three bases now: my primary in the USA and secondary in Europe (both have full assault squads, except all research happens in the US while nearly all production happens in Europe... there's a small manufacturing facility in the US for "need it now" items with short production times) and my newest base in the Far East - Indochina area. All have 1 Foxtrot and 2 Corsair interceptors, plus an extra open hangar for upgrades (the X-59 Marauder is nearly done being researched), and Europe has 2 suits of Predator armor produced. I guess that third base really helped because for the first time ever, all the countries are happy with me. ;)

 

About those differences... there's a big change in how UFOs spawn from UFO:EU. The game now throws waves upon waves of UFOs at you in a short period of time, and then it's dead quiet afterwards. Seriously, it's not uncommon to have 10-12 UFOs in the air at once. How you deal with the sudden glut of activity is another matter. I try to shoot down as much as possible over land to give my teams some training, but there are times when the stupid UFOs will stay over the water "strafing" every imaginable thing in the seemingly bustling oceans. In those cases you have to shoot down the UFO and just take the points. If there are three threats in the air over a base, I'll try to take out a small one and a medium one first, go back to base to refuel/rearm, then head out again to get the last UFO if it's still around. Sometimes I get lucky and that third one lands, then it's just a matter of sending out the troops to clean up the mess.

 

UFO designs are different as well, Almost all of them have some type of out swept "wings" or "arms" protruding on either side of the main door. Wanna knock at the door to see who is home? Good luck, hope you have someone with a lot of TUs able to traverse the distance around the "wing", open the door (and have someone else shoot at any enemies), then close the door and head back to safety. And if you look at the UFOs, almost all have a big cargo hold. Why do you need such large cargo holds though? What are they hauling? And why do most have long low walls? All it does is create clutter and bottlenecks. Tanks make short work of removing it though.

 

Tanks, I know I mentioned them before, but they are the best. I use them like fullbacks in American football: big husky blockers carving a path down the field for the rookies to follow and eliminate enemies. Almost all UFOs have doors big enough to let tanks in (at least, only on the ground floor, higher floors can only be accessed by 1x1 lifts). Remember those "wings" or "arms" on UFOs? Tanks can "plug the hole" while still allowing sniper fire to go over the top of them (best make sure you have some high accuracy snipers). ;)

 

As I said earlier, I have two bases with soldiers who actively run missions. My "primary" base in the USA has soldiers with a maximum of "only" 37 missions under their belts. Compare that to my base in Europe with soldiers having a max of 64 missions which is nearly 75% more. The pool of soldiers originally contained nearly everyone, my only criteria for transfer was that each base should have one soldier for each "main" role (Shield, Assault, Heavy Weapons, Rifleman, Sniper). Not really sure what the Scout role is for, it's default equipment is just a pistol - I'd much rather have a Shield doing the scouting as it adds more survive ability. Rocketeer is self explanatory which I don't use. And also a Specialist - soldier brandishing a rifle and rocket launcher + C4 in the backpack. I guess that's more of an "engineer" role, but rocket launchers and C4 are too heavy to be toting around every mission so I just use riflemen. Anyhow, long story short Europe is a really busy place for UFO activity. Case in point: my squad there all have 100 in TU, Strength and Accuracy now, plus one has 98 in health and my Heavy Weapons soldier has an amazing 82 reflexes. Talk about a killing machine, I wouldn't want to be the alien walking around in view of the heavy weapons guy. :)

 

Tanks are probably going to be coming to an end soon for my game. With Predator armor on the way and soldiers with nearly maxed out stats, they will basically take over tanking duty. I'll need to do a little soldier reorganizing soon as I want two squads of about equal skill and armor/makeup. The elimination of the tank will also free up three extra spots on the transport for more rookies. I shall miss it. yes.gif

 

- Zombie

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The other thing that is different, that in in UFO:EU UFOs sizes are random throught the game. Sure you can get a swarm of large/v.large but on base mission. Here the UFOs get bigger with time, so you should be fighting only Carriers / Battleships at the end, and fighting a battleship is just tedious. It made me a little bored fighting 50th Carrier in a row.

 

but rocket launchers and C4 are too heavy to be toting around every mission

 

I don't know, I've always had 2 rocketeers and did not complain about strength and if you have 100 STR soldier this shouldn't bother you at all. Now if you equip Singularity Cannon...

 

UFO designs are different as well, Almost all of them have some type of out swept "wings" or "arms" protruding on either side of the main door. Wanna knock at the door to see who is home? Good luck, hope you have someone with a lot of TUs able to traverse the distance around the "wing", open the door (and have someone else shoot at any enemies), then close the door and head back to safety. And if you look at the UFOs, almost all have a big cargo hold. Why do you need such large cargo holds though? What are they hauling? And why do most have long low walls? All it does is create clutter and bottlenecks. Tanks make short work of removing it though.

 

Or use a mod that allows to place breaching charges ;)

 

 

my primary in the USA and secondary in Europe (both have full assault squads, except all research happens in the US while nearly all production happens in Europe..

 

How's your budget? ;)

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The other thing that is different, that in UFO:EU UFOs sizes are random throughout the game. Sure you can get a swarm of large/v.large but on base mission. Here the UFOs get bigger with time, so you should be fighting only Carriers / Battleships at the end, and fighting a battleship is just tedious. It made me a little bored fighting 50th Carrier in a row.

 

Well, in EU the UFOs typically ramp up in size as the specific mission it's carrying out progresses. So it is sorta random. Another thing is that just as in Xenonauts, you'll be fighting the small stuff when you start out, then begin to fight the larger ships as time goes along. Not exclusively though. As you say, Cruisers and Carriers do predominate though. ;)

 

I don't know, I've always had 2 rocketeers and did not complain about strength and if you have 100 STR soldier this shouldn't bother you at all. Now if you equip Singularity Cannon...

 

Dunno, just seems like my starting squad never has the necessary strength to be able to handle rocket duty. Sure, as soldiers improve their strength goes up and then you'll be able to use them, but why? A tank can do the same thing if you really want explosives. Not saying rockets are bad or anything, as evidenced by NKF's all-rocket campaign challenge in UFO:EU. happy.png

 

Or use a mod that allows to place breaching charges wink.png

 

Eh, I'm running a pure vanilla game right now. tongue.png

 

How's your budget? wink.png

 

Ok? It's hard to base it on anything. But my funds are always hovering around the $4-5 million mark so I think that's decent... for now at least. Once I start churning out Marauders, Predator armor and (eventually) MAG weapons things might change. pardon.gif

 

- Zombie

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Some things which I miss in Xenonauts:

  1. Mind Probes. Can't tell anything about an alien now, maybe we should guess?
  2. Motion Scanner. Where's that last alien, or am I even close to it? True, now civilians and friendly combatants are present which would cloud the readings, but still... I want the option.
  3. Proximity Grenades. So much for setting up ambushes or to cover your tracks.
  4. Incendiary. Well, I guess it's technically in the game as the Alenium Rocket, but that's the only thing I know of with incendiary damage.
  5. Electro-flare. Come on, this is basic equipment kind of stuff. Yeah, a lot of missions have lighting present, and tanks have lighting too, but if you want to pinpoint a spot, you're out of luck.
  6. Blaster Launcher. It was nice setting waypoints and blasting a pack of aliens to smithereens. Would really come in handy for Carrier ships where the command room is huge and has a ton of furniture/junk in the way preventing clear shots.
  7. Mini map/overhead map. Which areas did I explore? Where are my troops in relation to alien units? Such a handy thing in the original game.
  8. Psionics. Some aliens get it, why not me too? At least give me a way to negate MC attacks.
  9. Grenade relay/throwing things. It wouldn't be exceptionally useful in Xeno, but there are times where I miss not being able to toss something.
  10. Drills. True, they were only in TFTD but it was a cool weapon nonetheless.

The other day my squad was easily cleaning up a Carrier crash site. Everything was going swimmingly well until I got pinned down by a flying Harridan camped out next to the ship's hull on the North-West side. My spotter could "see" it (due to the red alien icon present), but when you clicked on the icon the alien wouldn't show. I moved men around and kept checking every turn, but the alien wouldn't budge so I ended up in a war of attrition. I eventually said "hell with it" and cleared the inside of the ship and held it for three turns which ends the mission. It's an annoying bug, and happens in Cruiser ships too where the "top" or "height" of the ship covers up the South-West door. With that you can still right click on the door to gain entrance, but it's tricky. Anyone else have this happen to them? Is there a fix? wink.png

 

- Zombie

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The other day my squad was easily cleaning up a Carrier crash site. Everything was going swimmingly well until I got pinned down by a flying Harridan camped out next to the ship's hull on the North-West side. My spotter could "see" it (due to the red alien icon present), but when you clicked on the icon the alien wouldn't show. I moved men around and kept checking every turn, but the alien wouldn't budge so I ended up in a war of attrition. I eventually said "hell with it" and cleared the inside of the ship and held it for three turns which ends the mission. It's an annoying bug, and happens in Cruiser ships too where the "top" or "height" of the ship covers up the South-West door. With that you can still right click on the door to gain entrance, but it's tricky. Anyone else have this happen to them? Is there a fix? wink.png

 

Right then, another day, another Carrier mission. As always, my squad was easily mopping up the place until my shield man was shot by a Harridan somewhere above, this time along the South-West side of the UFO. Not a big deal as the shield sopped up the damage, so I sent him in to investigate. sorcerer.gif Because this was on the opposite side of the UFO, the hull was not blocking my view of the Harridan. Took a screenshot where I found it (look for the green legs).

 

20170909232125_1.jpg

 

Apparently this is WAI, and I'm fine with that, but having the hull block my view is cheating. Anyhow, mystery solved. sweat.gif

 

- Zombie

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There is flare on night mission in unlimited quantities....

 

From psionics you have defense, your bravery + higher rank and only 4 aliens have psionics.

 

About the Harridan, that's unfortunately game engine. It was made for 2D games, in fact the game is entirely 2D, the upper zones are cheating the engine. I've heard that the devs had to do a real cracking in order to pull this off.

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There is flare on night mission in unlimited quantities....

 

Wow, thanks never realized there were flares until you mentioned it. Had a hell of a time finding them though because I always have plenty of various grenades on each soldier either for use or "ballast" (weight, so soldier increases strength). If anyone is interested, you can right click on the grenade slot and it'll bring up a list of items one of which is the flare. ;)

 

From psionics you have defense, your bravery + higher rank and only 4 aliens have psionics.

 

That's like saying there's "only" 2 aliens in UFO which have MC, but at least there you have the the ability to train psionics which is your defense and offense. In Xeno you are limited to basically bravery which is hard to train specifically for. Sure, you can get medals which increase bravery by 1 pt, but other than that your soldiers train bravery in much the same manner as UFO.

 

About the Harridan, that's unfortunately game engine. It was made for 2D games, in fact the game is entirely 2D, the upper zones are cheating the engine. I've heard that the devs had to do a real cracking in order to pull this off.

 

I honestly don't care if aliens can spawn in sniper locations on the Carrier, just give me access to get to those locations. And don't have an elevated spawn point on the North-West side of the ship if I can't accurately target the alien there. Simple stuff really. Any more info about this (like a dev comment or a discussion about it somewhere) would be greatly appreciated. :)

 

- Zombie

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Well, yes those suits would allow you to get to the same level, but not INTO the spot where the Harridan is camped out. Besides, you're locked out from shooting while airborne so you still have to land to shoot anyway. I was thinking more along the lines of a redesign of the ship itself to give everyone access to those areas. Access means that my troops can get to the alien face-to-face and poke it with a stun stick, shoot at it, whatever. wink.png And I shouldn't need a suit with flying capabilities to get there either, give me stairs or a lift or a transporter.

 

- Zombie

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I'm sure in Xenos 2 there won't be this issue.

 

I sure hope not. wink.png

 

Yet another Carrier ship today, and yes, another camped out Harridan in it's perch. Just about the best way to handle Carriers+Harridans is to actually go through the front door with your breaching squad (Shield, Assault, Riflemen, Heavy Weapons) and clean out that area first. Meanwhile, move a couple snipers to the SW edge of the map on one side. Make them kneel, and hold tight from distance. Next round your squad inside should make it to the two inner doors. Have them cover the doors and move your Harridan "spotter" to the SW side exterior doors of the ship where your snipers are. Who the spotter is depends on team makeup, but I suggest someone with a lot of HP+Armor+TU (and preferably higher reflexes too). Next round, clean out the rest of the first floor and plug the lifts to prevent anything filtering down. Move your spotter one tile out of the exterior door and hold. The Harridan can't see anyone yet, but we know he's basically right above us. Next round, just move your spotter out a couple tiles and look to the ship - hopefully you'll see it in which case it can be dispatched by the snipers. The reason you want to someone with high TU and reflexes is so he doesn't trigger a reaction shot from the Harridan. You'll want this person with high Armor and HP because if the Harridan does fire, at least you might survive. :D

 

If there wasn't a Harridan on that side, there may be one on the NE side. I would suggest avoiding that situation like the plague. The hull of the ship blocks any way for your snipers to target the alien. I suppose if you had a rocket launcher dude or a tank with explosive ammo you could use them as the "snipers" instead as I think the splash damage from a nearby detonation would kill the Harridan. It'll also destroy the corpse, but hey, the kill still counts. So that's an alternative strategy if you need the kills. Otherwise if you don't want to chance it, just clear the rest of the ship and hold it for 3 rounds to win the mission. happy.png

 

- Zombie

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Armor does not count against Harridan sniper. Alien sniper rifles have 99 armor mitigation I think or 90, so it pierces even predator armor. I've sort of hate this armor mitigation thing and I also hate the stats progress in ranks in Xenos. Where for example Ceasan non combatant has stat of a rookie soldier, Caesan Elite has like ~200HP, only mag weapons could kill him in one shot. Or maybe it was 150, but anyway elites have higher health values than mutons. And with Battle Rifles they just auto shot you from accross the map. Also the Battle rifle has big armor mitigatin - I think it was something of 25-50, so basically your armor is just for the bonuses. Predator for better heavy weapons handling and Sentinel for 360 view angle + flying over the edges.
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Yeah, just tried again with my previous save and the Harridan was chewing right through my armor. So I guess armor is meaningless with the Alien Sniper Rifle. Had a look through the weapons_gc.xml file because I was curious about mitigation. The Alien Sniper Rifle does indeed have 99 mitigation, but the Assault Plasma has 10, Heavy Plasma Rifle is 30 and Battle Rifle is also 30. Interestingly, Reaper Claws have an incredible 500 mitigation and my namesake, the Zombie, is 40. :)

 

Suppose I should mention another difference in Xeno, Sebillians regenerate health. Duh! But no aliens have this feature in X-COM. On another Carrier mission, one of my "green" snipers was plugging away at a beast from a distance, but it was regenerating about 50-55 health units per turn. Talk about one step forwards and two steps back! I did eventually kill it, but only because there was a building next to it where a few team members could get close to ensure damage. With these aliens you almost certainly need to double (or even triple) team Sebillians.

 

UFO doors close automatically during the aliens round like in UFO, but now soldiers can open and close them themselves. The benefits to this are immeasurable. Afraid of reaction fire during a retreat? No problem, close the door and then leave. Now you can stage your teams right at the doors instead of around it which saves some TU next turn. Worried you might not have enough TU to shoot an alien and retreat? Here again, have someone else (aka cannon fodder) open the door and now you probably will have enough points leftover to get back behind the door for safety. Aliens normally stay holed up in the command room thinking it's safer to camp than to bum rush the door, so that's another reason why doors are important. The only time you'll have a problem is with Androns (and to a lesser extent, soldiers wearing Predator armor). They will smash through doors like a bull in a china shop so it becomes inoperable (and always open).

 

Sometimes a door to an alien ship will remain open (Carrier is a prime example) for some reason. If there aren't Androns around, you are pretty safe to assume you can close it again though. I had to do this today actually. For the first time since I started this new campaign, the tank got to sit out in lieu of 2 greenhorns which needed improving. One had pretty low health and firing accuracy, so he had a shield and a plasma pistol while another got a plasma rifle. Now, you would assume that a Shrike dropship having a capacity of 10 soldiers should have a capacity of 6 soldiers and a tank (4 tiles big), but no, it can actually carry 8 soldiers and a tank. (The Xenopedia does mention tanks count as 2 spots, though I never read it carefully). Anyhow, these 2 newbies were in cover just in front of the main door, but I didn't want them to be sitting ducks if they made a dash to it and it couldn't be closed. So I had a soldier with a lot of APs close the door first, then brought in most of my team.

 

Right now, I'm at that point in the game where I'm torn between weapons and aircraft. My main production base was in the process of constructing my first Marauder aircraft, but I didn't produce enough plasma weaponry to equip the newbies with them. I wanted these guys to get some kills and to do that they need high damage weapons. What I ended up doing was equipping some of my vets with laser weapon equivalents instead, and giving the newbies the plasmas. The rationale being that the vets will make every bullet count due to their higher accuracy, while the newbies would play cleanup. Because they have mediocre accuracy you can only really count on one bullet of a burst connecting so you need higher damage to level the field and ensure a kill. What do you guys think about this? This situation is only temporary as the Marauder is completed and my manufacturing team is now producing a couple plasma rifles and plasma pistol but that takes time. In the other part of the world, my research base is hard at work figuring out MAG weaponry (still only "Good" status so it'll be a while before I get them). I'm almost leaning to constructing another workshop to help the process along.

 

With all the incoming cashflow from large-massive UFO missions, I built my fourth base in South America. Seems like a good place as the aliens are constantly buzzing around there. I figure I can equip this base with hand-me-down Foxtrots and Corsairs when enough Marauders are built to upgrade my aging fleet. Dumb question, but how many defense batteries are enough to prevent base attacks from getting through? My two main bases have three each because they also have soldiers and tanks to defend, but what about my other non-soldier, non-tank bases? Should they have more than three? (At this time it's plasma defenses but will be MAGs soon enough).

 

Anyhow, back to the grindstone! :D

 

- Zombie

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I would advise not producing plasmas if you got MAG at good level. I've never ever built base defenses, my Aircraft where good enough defense. With 3 Maruaders you could shot down anything, the only issue might be Battleship, but if you research MAG weapons and then MAG explosives, this things will drop any UFOs fast.

 

2 aircraft with 3-4 Plasma torpedoes down a carrier, and I think 6 fusion bombs should work on Battleship. I made 6 hangarsd in my base and had a config of 4 bombers and 2 interceptors therefore if UFO had escort I just used 2 interceptors for the escort armed with missiles and bomber straight for the UFO. Dealing with escort is easy enough, then you play ring around the rosie with the big guy.

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I would advise not producing plasmas if you got MAG at good level. I've never ever built base defenses, my Aircraft where good enough defense. With 3 Maruaders you could shot down anything, the only issue might be Battleship, but if you research MAG weapons and then MAG explosives, this things will drop any UFOs fast.

 

Well, it's not like I'm starting production on plasma weapons for the first time or anything, I'm just trying to fill the voids of my troops who are carrying lasers. Even if MAG weapons research finishes right now, it'll still take a while to manufacture them (and in the case of my American base, transfer weapons to them). I'm just worried I'll get a terror site (it's been a long time and I'm probably due if a ship sneaks through), or an alien base because that hasn't happened yet either. Or maybe I'm being too careful. wink.png

 

So no base defenses at all then? Interceptors take care of everything? What happens if your interceptors are damaged and are incapable of flight when the UFO is inbound? Right now I only have 5 hangars at each of my bases:

  1. American base: 1 Shrike, 1 Foxtrot, 2 Corsairs + 1 empty hangar for ship transfers
  2. Europe base: 1 Shrike, 1 Marauder, 2 Corsairs + 1 empty hangar for ship building
  3. Indochina base: 2 Foxtrots, 2 Corsairs + 1 empty hangar for transfers

I also have that new base in South America which has 5 days left till I can build structures. This will be the "hand-me-down" base for aircraft, so I'll probably have 6 hangars there - might as well get some more use out of the aircraft while the switchover to Marauders is taking place. The Foxtrots will probably be retired soon though as the Marauders are a direct replacement. Honestly, I'm handling everything the aliens have been throwing at me (mostly the bigger stuff now like Cruisers and Carriers) with just the Foxtrot + 2 Corsair setup although admittedly I never got around to researching plasma explosives yet so the Foxtrots still have Alenium Torpedoes on them. oh.gif I suppose it's not even worthwhile to complete that as MAG is in the pipes, right? rolleyes.gif

 

2 aircraft with 3-4 Plasma torpedoes down a carrier, and I think 6 fusion bombs should work on Battleship. I made 6 hangarsd in my base and had a config of 4 bombers and 2 interceptors therefore if UFO had escort I just used 2 interceptors for the escort armed with missiles and bomber straight for the UFO. Dealing with escort is easy enough, then you play ring around the rosie with the big guy.

 

So you're talking a pure interception base, not a base with dropships correct? I'm curious what is your setup for a assault base with a dropship is because those are my primary bases right now. And I'm not going to be playing ring around the rosie with big ships anytime soon, it's all auto-resolve for me. yes.gif

 

I ended up building another workshop for my manufacturing base in Europe yesterday as shipbuilding takes a very long time with only 2 workshops. Is it advisable to decommission the workshop at my first base, transfer the engineers to Europe and then plop in another lab to jumpstart research?dntknw.gif

 

- Zombie

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So no base defenses at all then? Interceptors take care of everything? What happens if your interceptors are damaged and are incapable of flight when the UFO is inbound? Right now I only have 5 hangars at each of my bases:

 

Interceptors damaged? Come on, the air combat is not that difficult ;) I probably can count number of damaged aircraft that must be grounded probably in one hand. I don't think I've ever encountered base defense mission. Generally I had like too many missions because of so many shot downs :)

 

I suggest picking any video here, probably from the rear end just to have a view on fully build bases. And I don't know why you have 4 bases :) Generally I had like Main Base in EuroAsia, then fast base in Americas, last base in Asia so I had all the important ground covered. Base number 3 also had later research capability, while base 1 and 2 focused on produciton I think and I've passed used weapons from base 1 to 2, and later gave few colonels just so the rookies whould have someone competenet to guide them.

 

 

 

I've double checked with one of my videos and here is the overlay of base:

 

IQGdJmy.jpg

 

 

HUKvSxm.jpg

 

The one slot I left was for the Fury ;) So maybe I've exaggerated a little on the numbers but still that's all what I needed and never felt unprotected.

 

Heaohgt.jpg

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Ah, thanks very much for the info and pics, that helps tremendously! :) I really need to watch all the Xeno videos you put out sometime.

 

Why I have 4 bases is due to a few reasons, namely that in my last game I almost lost due to losing too many funding areas while having only 2 bases. So I thought the trick was to build a lot of bases as fast as you can to get decent radar coverage (which I believe I mentioned earlier in this thread but nobody called me out on). ;) Also (and this ties into the first point), my bases are more scattered which left some holes in radar coverage. I see you built 3 bases all near the middle of the map on each of the landmasses whereas I put a base in the Midwest of the US, the "heel" of Italy and Java. So that leaves a big gap in radar coverage in South America (which Is the reason for the 4th base), a smaller (and IMHO tolerable) gap in South Africa and NE Russia (admittedly a huge swath of land though why would you want to cover Siberia but this also includes parts of China, Japan & Mongolia too).

 

I'm not planning on a full 3 radar module base for South America, just enough to fill the gap - though I have to see if building the 3 modules will give some coverage into South Africa as well, but I think I built too far west in S. America unfortunately. I will have to put some interceptors in S. America as I don't have a lot of ability to shoot down UFOs in the southern hemisphere which is where I'm lacking right now. Also, the aliens have just decided to create a terror site in Vladivostok so coverage is going to be an issue there as well. It's the erratic routes the UFOs fly that is the bigger problem. It seems like as soon as you get close to a UFO, they do a 180 and run, then when you return to base they resume their original heading. That's the infuriating part! pinch.gif

 

- Zombie

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