Researchable Items

[Danial]

Of all of the researchable Battlescape items, how would you rank their usefulness from 0-10?

(0 being useless and 10 being irreplaceable)

 

Weapons

- Laser Weaponry: 0-10

- Plasma Weaponry: 0-10

- Small Launcher: 0-10

- Blaster Launcher: 0-10

- Alien Grenade: 0-10

 

Equipment:

- Psi-Amp: 0-10

- Medi-kit: 0-10

- Motion Scanner: 0-10

- Mind Probe: 0-10

 

Armour:

- Personal Armour: 0-10

- Power Suit: 0-10

- Flying Suit: 0-10

 

HWPs:

- Tank/Laser: 0-10

- Hovertank/Plasma: 0-10

- Hovertank/Launcher: 0-10

 

(Hope I didn't miss anything)

[NKF]

The thing is, to me, none of those items are useless or indispensable. They're all useful in their own ways but are at the same time not necessities.

 

Plasma and laser weapons for example - you don't need them to win the game, but they can come in handy (particularly against aliens with lots of armour). Same goes for armour, tanks, psi amps and blasters.

 

So how does a guy who likes and uses everything vote? I'd say a 5 in everything for me and leave it at that.

 

- NKF

[Jman4117]

Weapons

- Laser Weaponry: Pistol - 8 Rifle - 8 Heavy - 5

- Plasma Weaponry: Pistol - 6 Rifle - 2 Heavy - 9

- Small Launcher: 7

- Blaster Launcher: 8

- Alien Grenade: 6

 

Equipment:

- Psi-Amp: 8

- Medi-kit: 10

- Motion Scanner: 3

- Mind Probe: 1

 

Armour:

- Personal Armour: 4

- Power Suit: 8

- Flying Suit: 10

 

HWPs:

- Tank/Laser: 7

- Hovertank/Plasma: 9

- Hovertank/Launcher: 6

[Zombie]

Here's my opinions, and why:

 

Weapons

- Laser Weaponry: Pistol - 7, Rifle - 8, Heavy - 6

- Plasma Weaponry: Pistol - 2, Rifle - 3, Heavy - 9

- Small Launcher: 5

- Blaster Launcher: 8

- Alien Grenade: 4

 

As you may see, I love all the Laser weapons and use them quite often. Plasma weaponry is a little different. See, the aliens phase out their usage of the Plasma Pistol and Rifle pretty quick. That creates ammo shortages early on, and later, you are forced to produce the ammo. That sucks. Therefore, I just forget about them and focus on the Heavy Plasma. Granted, there will probably be ammo shortages early on when the aliens are still using the pistol and rifle. However, after they switch over to the Heavy Plasma, I am forced to sell off the extra clips because they are so plentiful.

 

Rarely do I use the Small Launcher, because I am so comfortable with the Stun Rod. It is effective though, hence the 5 for a rating. I use Blaster Launchers, but sparingly. They do have a use, and when you need one it sure comes in handy. Alien grenades? Hmmm. I use them, but only when I scavenge them off of corpses during a mission.

 

Equipment:

- Psi-Amp: 8

- Medi-Kit: 10

- Motion Scanner: 2

- Mind Probe: 10

 

I tend to use Psionic powers frequently, but only when it is necessary. Handy thing to have because you need it for a Psi-Attack. There is no substitute for a Medi-Kit. I use them all the time to revive an alien or two during my alien base smash 'n grab routine, as waiting for them to recover on their own takes too long. If it wasn't for this fact, I'd give the Medi-Kit a rating of 5 since my soldiers only really need it once and a while.

 

In the past, I never used the Motion Scanner, but after my tests with it I have one along. Again, I use the Mind Probe frequently during my alien base smash 'n grab. If I wouldn't do those missions, I'd give the Mind Probe a 4.

 

Armour:

- Personal Armour: 3

- Power Suit: 7

- Flying Suit: 10

 

I use Personal Armor, but rarely. Most often, I only produce a few of these for the guys I'd like to keep around. I save the rest of the Alien Alloys for the Power Suits and Flying Suits. Power Suits are very important, but the Flying Suit is irreplaceable in my book. Ever on a mission in the arctic? Ever have your transport cut off from the alien ship because of water? The only way to finish the mission is with Flying Suits!

 

HWP's:

- Tank/Laser: -4

- Hovertank/Plasma: 6

- Hovertank/Launcher: 5

 

I really hate the Tank/Laser Cannon. I mean, if it had some improvement over the previous types (like more armor, higher health, or more TU), I'd use it more often. Sorry, the high weapon power doesn't add much either, especially when the thing can only move as far as an average soldier who's been around a little. The Hovertanks are better, in that they have more armor, higher health, and more TU. Their primary drawback for me is cost. If you'd lose a Hovertank/Launcher, that's like a million smackers down the drain. I'd much rather put that money towards more soldiers or an Avenger.

[Danial]

There is no substitute for a Medi-Kit. I use them all the time to revive an alien or two during my alien base smash 'n grab routine, as waiting for them to recover on their own takes too long.

What is this "smash 'n grab" routine? Why are you reviving Aliens?

[Pete]

Y'know, that statement would make sense if you replace the word alien with squad member...

[Hobbes]

...otherwise we will have to report you to the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty Against Aliens

[Bomb Bloke]

Zombie's 'smash 'n grab' raids are his way of getting excessive scores and elerium supplies.

 

He attacks a base, but doesn't kill every alien, nor does he destroy the control center.

 

The safest way to do this would be to stun an alien, then revive it. This way, you can kill all the OTHER aliens without completing the mission, and the dis-armed alien won't attack. If he left it stunned and killed all the others, the mission would be over. To make sure the thing gets up before he's killed all it's buddies, the medkit comes into play.

 

Once he's killed everything else in the base, he grabs the elerium and any other goodies, and drags it all off to the lift before aborting the mission. The base is then left intact, and he can repeat the process, however many times per month.

 

I will note that I've never had my craft cut off from a UFO by water during an arctic mission, though. :lol:

[NKF]

I'd rather just go after the supply ship if my base is nearby. However, the supply ships don't come that frequently, and the bases reset for every mission, so there's absolutely nothing wrong with smash-n-grab if you are after a series of continuous missions. I often do a minor variation of it in TFTD to steal disrupter pulse launchers myself.

 

I see few people rate the plasma rifle as being particularly useful. I can easily see why: ammo availability.

 

But I thought I'd mention it anyway: Has anyone considered hoarding the ammo and then keeping only one or two plasma rifles and using them as specialist training weapons? I mean, they may not be able to be used on a regular basis, but if used by one or two soldiers for the whole game, your stockpile should be able to hold out for quite a while.

 

They don't pack the same punch as the heavy plasma, but they do offer unparallelled snapshot accuracy, making them a very good sniping weapon. The difference in snapshot accuracy is this: Heavyplasmas do 75% snapshots. With kneeling, this becomes 86%. With the plasma rifle, it already does 86%. Kneel and you get 98.9%, which means you get to use 98% (I think the game rounds down rather than up so we lost that .9). of your accuracy stat. So if you have 100 accuracy, you'll be doing 98% accurate snapshots. Once you get even better, you never need to kneel again. Once you get EVEN better, you can swap the plasma rifle with the heavy plasma and achieve clost to 100% snapshots. A true technologickal marvel of pseudo science and number crunchery!

 

Just something to think over.

 

- NKF

[Jman4117]

I do something similar with the plasma pistol. I equip a high reaction stormtrooper with a plasma pistol and a small launcher (or rocket laucher/laser pistol early game). In large ships he goes through the hole I blow in the bridge to clean house.

 

And that is basically the main use I have for either of those two guns, but I wipe the floor with half the crew usually so that would be my most prized combo.

[Zombie]

Bomb Bloke's explanation of my "alien base smash 'n grab routine" is right on the money. But the purpose of those battles is a little different. My original intention for those missions was strictly for legitimate soldier training, nothing more. The gathering of alien bodies, weapons and Elerium-115 was simply a by-product of these exercises, as was amassing huge point scores and cash. However, when I really need to test something out in the game those extra points, cash, weapons and Elerium-115 help tremendously! No denying that!

 

Now, I did hoard every last Plasma Pistol and Rifle clip I came across in my alien base "smash 'n grab" adventures. Unfortunately, I first implimented this technique after the first alien base was built which was the end of March 1999. By this time, Plasma Pistols were few and far between. In addition, Plasma Rifles were becomming rather scarce by the end of April 1999.

 

By my calculations, I gathered roughly 150 Plasma Psitol Clips from Jan-Apr 1999, and 300 Plasma Rifle clips from the same time period. You have to remember one important fact: people normally don't gather those clips in the manner that I do. I suspect that you might only collect 1/4 to 1/2 as many clips as I did, simply because I ran more missions, and those missions had more aliens than the average UFO does.

 

Ammo availability now rears it's ugly head once again. If an X-COM soldier was assigned to just shoot with the Plasma Pistol on every mission, he'd use up the 150 clips in 150 missions. (I'm pretty sure the computer version handles partially spent clips in the same manner as the Playstation does. Even if you use one bullet the clip is considered spent). How long will it take to complete 150 missions? Well, that's up to the player. If I were to use a Plasma Pistol Clip in every alien base smash 'n grab I go to, that works out to 2 1/2 months time with Skyrangers. Then again, it depends on the number of clips you were able to scavenge in the first place.

 

The same thing goes for the Plasma Rife, though not as much. If you were able to gather 125 Plasma Rifle Clips before the aliens phase them out, you would use them up in 125 missions.

 

Personally, I would much rather use the Laser Rifle for training because it does not have any ammunition restrictions. Those rookie soldiers normally have poor firing accuracy, and having a weapon that doesn't require clips ensures that he/she won't burn through an entire clip just to kill a single alien. Sure, the Plasma Rifle has better Auto and Snap shot accuracies than the Laser Rifle (10% more for the Auto and 20% more for the Snap base values) and does on average 20 more points of damage. But factor in the Firing Accuracy (55 for the average rookie), and the accuracies aren't much to brag about anymore:

Laser Rifle Auto Shot: 25%

Laser Rifle Snap Shot: 35%

Plasma Rifle Auto Shot: 30%

Plasma Rifle Snap Shot: 47%

 

Need I even explain probabilities of inflicting a certain damage number between Plasma and Laser Rifles? Let's just say that assuming an alien is 100% susceptible to each ammo type, the range of the Plasma doing 160 max damage is 161. The range of the Laser Rifle is 121. The smaller the range, the greater the probability of inflicting max damage. In this case, the Laser has a 20% greater chance of inflicting max damage than the Plasma does. Granted, the Plasma Rifle can inflict 25% more total damage, but you have to weigh the pros and the cons. Does a 5% difference in total damage vs. the probability of doing max damage for the Plasma Rifle, outweigh the Laser Rifle's no ammo constraint? I don't think so. I'll stick to my trusty Laser Rifle for training rookies, thank you!

[NKF]

Fair enough. My plasma rifle clip collection through the course of a normal game (well, normal as in I just go after the neighbour's occasional supply ship as well) generally gives me a number under 200. As I use all sorts of equipment, I tend to use the plasma rifle sparingly and only when necessary.

 

For me, it's not the really the damage that matters, but the precision. My use of the plasma rifle as a training weapon goes more along the lines of training up soldiers who are already quite adept at firearms (or just one soldier who's got accuracy that is leagues above the rest and can make full use of that 98.8% kneeling snapshot).

 

Or, I sometimes just hand it to a soldier who is really good at shooting and keep them at it. I mean, with 100+% accurate snapshots, I can easily live with a slightly slower stat increase. With a flying suit, this soldier can offer protection for all the new trainees out in the field who are unable to defend themselves from any particular threat (given a good line of sight).

 

One not particularly useful fact about the plasma rifle is that it has the most accurate burst attack in the game (though it's the slowest of the plasma weapons for auto shots). But really, there are better auto fire weapons such as the laser pistol and the heavy plasma.

 

The laser rifle I'd agree is a lot better for training everyone in general because who cares if you miss? You can always try again, and as experience is hit based, the more you hit, the larger the stat boost dice becomes (of course, the better you are the more effort needs to be put in too, but that's expected).

 

Ah well. Everything has its place.

 

- NKF

[The Veteran]

Let's be honest, you could arm your squad blind by the end of the game and you've probably got a 70:30 chance of ending up with enough half decent weapons to win the war on terror, or enemy, whichever game you're playing (aha ha )

 

(PM me if you lesser beings need an explanation on that last appauling pun...)

 

But seriously, there are no bad weapons, they just tend to become obsolete after a while. For example, Heavy cannon, Blaster bomb... XCom rifle, plasma rifle... rover metro, panzer tank...

 

It's all about testosterone, the bigger, the badder, the better it is! I always take my squads with heavy plasmas, blaster launchers and psi-weapony things... XCom forgive me I forget their name

 

That's all I feel I need but other people go all out with grenades and lasers. Whatever you fancy will probably suit you best. Just go for it!

[Zombie]

For rookies, the Plasma Rifle really isn't a good training choice, simply because of the accuracy of the guy firing the weapon. I will admit that once your rookies improve their FA somewhat, then the Plasma Rifle is better than it's laser counterpart. More damage, better accuracy, light and cheap, what more could you ask for? An unlimited supply of ammo, please! You can't have everything.

 

The best thing about not using the Plasma Pistol and Plasma Rifle is this: If you sell a Plasma Pistol Clip, that's $4,400 and if you sell a Rifle Clip it's $6,290. If you have like 200 Plasma Pistol Clips, you would net $880,000. 300 Plasma Rifle Clips would be $1,887,000. When funds are sometimes in short supply at the start of a game, it's nice that those clips can suppliment your income for a short while.

 

By the way, where did you come up with a base chance to hit accuracy of 98.9% for a soldier having 100 FA, using a Snap shot from a Plasma Rifle, and kneeling? Ok, a Snap Shot from a Plasma Rifle has an 86% accuracy rating. Multiply this by the soldier's FA/100 yields the base chance to hit. Since this soldier has 100 for FA, his base chance to hit stays at 86%. If the soldier is kneeling down, he gets a +15% increase to the 86%. That comes to 101%, not 98.9%.

 

Let's just assume for the moment that the game calculates a shot having an accuracy of 98.9%. When you click on the weapon, it says 98%, not 98.9%. The game actually truncates the number (or drops the numbers to the right of the decimal point) for viewing purposes. But what happens to the .9? Is it included in determining the accuracy of the shot, or does the game ignore fractional accuracies and use the whole number instead? There's no way to know. I have a feeling that the game actually retains those digits for determing shot accuracy, but drops them for viewing.

[NKF]

100 * 0.86 * 1.15 = 98.9

 

The +15% means an additional 15% of the overall final value rather than directly adding 15 to the percentage.

 

I'm really not sure about how the fractions are stored, but if I were to hazzard a guess, it might be calculated with the fractions, but then drops it for the final value.

 

- NKF

[Zombie]

Let's take an example:

 

Soldier XYZ has a Firing Accuracy of 55%.

He is using a Laser Rifle which has an accuracy of 46% for Auto Shots, 65% for Snap Shots, and 100% for Aimed Shots.

 

His Base Chance to Hit a target is (0.55) * 46 = 25.3% for Auto, (0.55) * 65 = 35.75% for Snap, and (0.55) * 100 = 55% for an Aimed Shot. The game shows XYZ's accuracies as 25%, 35% and 55%.

 

If the game would use the fractional accuracies for determining the final chance to hit when kneeling, it would use the 25.3%, 35.75% and 55% numbers, then apply the 1.15 multiplier to get the kneeling. (25.3) * 1.15 = 29.095%, (35.75) * 1.15 = 41.1125%, and (55) * 1.15 = 63.25%. Then the game should truncate the results to theoretically show 29%, 41% and 63%.

 

When I kneel XYZ down and check his accuracies, they are 28%, 40% and 63%. Just a little bit off. Assuming the game uses the Truncated values for Base Chance to Hit to determine the kneeling accuracy, it would use 25%, 35% and 55%. Multiplying these numbers by 1.15 (the kneeling modifier) yields accuracies of 28.75%, 40.25% and 63.25%. After truncation of the digits, the numbers are 28%, 40% and 63%.

 

So we are both wrong there NKF. The game does use the truncated numbers for determining the overall accuracy of a shot. They aren't just for show. Obviously, the game doesn't make room for numbers having decimals. That surprised me somewhat!

[Bomb Bloke]

I'm guessing the program stores all those values as INT types (auto-truncation, basically).

[OmegaTwo]

Weapons

- Laser Weaponry: 7

I like no-ammo weapons... and it helped me a LOT when I played first time, because I screwed up with my researches and took ages to get plasma weapons.

 

- Plasma Weaponry: 9

Plasma rifles forever! Heavy plasmas only in desperate situations, like base defenses or colony invasions.

 

- Small Launcher: 10

Considering that I like to have all aliens researched, I must use this weapon.

 

- Blaster Launcher: 2

I research it, but usually don't take blasters in missions. Scavenging the from dead aliens is better. I never needed to use that much firepower, only in specific situations (like invading landed very large ships or alien colonies)

 

- Alien Grenade: 10

Yeah, there comes a time that normal grenades just don't cut anymore.... then I switch to Alien Grenades (and I don't use many grenades per mission, so I usually have a large stock of these).

 

Equipment:

- Psi-Amp: 0

Never used.

 

- Medi-kit: 10

Are you kidding me? The Medi-Kit is irreplaceable! Each soldier must go to missions with one of them.

 

- Motion Scanner: 5

Useful to find hidden aliens... or to know that there is a reaper just behind the door.

 

- Mind Probe: 0

Never used. I'm not into psichic stuff.

 

Armour: 10

All of them are useful. I lost the count of how many times I thanked God because my soldiers were using armor.

 

HWPs: 6

I rarely used them... never got comfortable with a big mobile target like that crawling around, even when they can shoot blaster bombs.

[Danial]

You've never used a Psi-Amp? Wow. That's my favourite piece of equipment! I love being able to play as the Alien and use their own weapons to kill each other!

[OmegaTwo]

Nah... no Psi-Amps... my style is more "drop a few grenades, run for cover, shoot, shoot, shoot, advance, do it all again". Worked fine with me until I reached Cydonia. Then I needed to go Kamikaze (my greatest use of Blaster Bombs... something like: "Hey, a Sectoid! Fire! *BLAMMOOOO!* Less one sectoid... and all those guys that were hiding near him..." pretty funny, having scavenged Blaster Bombs to share and spare...).

[Fox]

Yeah I'd like to just point out how amazing the Plasma Rifle is later in the game. The accuracy on it for snap and aimed is the highest in the game. It is a total sniper rifle. I manufacture clips for it because it is so damned accurate.

[Ross]

- Psi Amp: 0

 

As for Psi Amps, I hate them. I used to love playing around with them, and forcing aliens to shoot their brothers and blow themselves to pieces, but it makes the game less tactical. All it takes is for one guy to spot an alien while a high-Psi soldier in the Skyranger has enough points left over, then you've virtually won.

[Zombie]

I will note that I've never had my craft cut off from a UFO by water during an arctic mission, though. :lol:

Finally! It took a long time, but now I have proof in the form of a screenshot that your ship can be cut off from the UFO on an arctic mission:

 

 

Of course, on this particular mission you could just wait for the aliens to come out of the craft, but that could take ages. Multi-level UFOs are tougher still because the higher ranking aliens refuse to leave the command level.

 

Getting this cut-off to happen is possible - it's all in how the game decides which tileset blocks to use in an arctic mission.

 

- Zombie

[Danial]

It looks like the North-West corner is accessible.

[Zombie]

It sure looks that way, doesn't it? In fact, the overhead map for this scenario showed at least a one-tile snow buffer on all sides. But the darn UFO is to blame in this instance as the north and west side walls stick out by one tile. There goes the buffer - and your ability to gain entry into the ship.

 

- Zombie