64 replies to this topic

[BladeFireLight]

For an undamaged UFO how much has everyone found on each type?
[Edit Zombie: changed title to Elerium]
-Blade FireLight

[NKF]

1 Elerium pod per power unit. Or a total elerium of 50 x n power units, where n is the number of power units found.

The only exception being alien bases, where the module with two power units only has 1 power unit that is powered. (I don't know if the unique cydonia base module (which you cannot access) is powered or not, not that it matters)

In TFTD, there are tons of Ion Beam Accelerators(all shapes and sizes, apparently), but only a select few are actually 'powered' with zrbite.

- NKF

[JellyfishGreen]

power unit=engine=glowy orange cylinder with purple Elerium pod in the base

Supply ships have a sweet 3 engines, x50 = 150 elerium

[Psy Guy]

Ship Name           Amount of E-115
Small Scout         0 (Forget the E-115. Give me what ever powers the small scout)
Medium Scout      50
Large Scout         50
Harvester            100
Abductor             100
Terror ship          100
Supply ship         150
Battleship           200
Alien Bases         *   *(2)

*Depends on the layout
*(2) Amiga versons have 0 E-115 in alien bases

[Zombie]

NKF - I assume that for a Power Source to be "powered" it requires 1 canister of Elerium-115 or 50 units, right?

The Power Sources in the Cydonia base mission do not have Elerium powering them. The base of a normal Power Source has a small "plate" on the front that is usually purple in color if it has Elerium inside. Cydonian Power Sources are grey in color so obviously no Elerium (I shot them out to be sure).

As for the Power Sources at an alien base - if they can be found  at a base they always have Elerium powering them. So 2 power sources yield 100 units of Elerium. At least this is true for the PSX version - I'll have to try this on the PC sometime.

How can those Small Scouts even fly without some sort of power source or navigational inputs? Remote control? Very strange!

[Zombie]

I almost forgot!

Terror Ships have 4 Power Sources yielding 200 units of Elerium.
Other than that, those numbers are correct Psy Guy.

NKF - Those "unique" modules you speak of in Cydonia, do they look the same as the ones in a normal base? A long corridor on level 0 leading up to a room with 4 doors on level 1, right? I can access the power source room like any other room with a door at base. Unless you have a radically different PC version of the game!  

[BladeFireLight]

I belive he's talking about map "ubase_12"  it's basicly a dead end on all 4 sides, unless you fly over the wall because the second floor is all open space.

-Blade FireLight

[NKF]

Correct, it is indeed a dead-end module, which you cannot properly access(there are walls on all sides). You can use xcomutil to reveal its contents, and there are a number of power sources in there. Still, as it only appears on the cydonia mission, any elerium in it would just be void.


As for the module with the long corridor and the four store rooms, that has two power sources in it, but only one is powered. No idea why. At least this is true for the PC version.

- NKF

[BladeFireLight]

I was under the opinion that not all power sorces had fule in either game.  It would make sence if they all were, but then the game would have an almost endless supply of elerium/zerbit

[EclipseDog]

Actually having no fuel cells in the power sources makes sense when you think about it from a certain mindset. The kamakazi mindset. Those aliens are determined to take our world and retreat is not an option. They are given only enough fuel cells to reach their intended destination and then fulfill their mission parameters. If they won only then would the supply flotila arrive with endless stores of fuel.

There is just one thing I don't understand... why don't any of the ships ever have a pantry full of extra fuel cells... certainly not all of those aliens are expendable (such as the leaders and commanders). So why don't we ever come across any stacked fuel cells inside a storage unit or locked away in some room on-ship? I mean if you think about it... the elerium on the hybrid crafts use up their fuel cells just travelling across the globe. Even if the full alien craft handle the fuel usage at a much better rate it still would not explain how they could travel even the distance from Mars to Earth... and I doubt I even have to explain the insanely impossible task of intergalactic travel with that kind of a fuel rate usage and no fuel cell stock rooms.

[Zombie]

EclipseDog - Not too long ago I did some number crunching on how long it would take a UFO to reach Earth from Mars according to their maximum velocity. The Small Scout would take 2 Years, 69 days and change to reach Earth (799 days). The Battleship would take 351.9 days or a little less than a year at its maximum velocity!

On average, Earth is 48,600,000 miles from Mars. So let us assume a one-month trip to get to Earth is a tolerable amount of time. To get a speed out of this you need to divide 48,600,000 miles by 730.5 (the average number of hours in an average month in an average year). The result is 66,530 mph, 107,069 kph, 57,813 knots, or over Mach 87.5! NASA's space shuttle returns from earths orbit at a speedy Mach 25 but this is nowhere near the Mach 88 average sustainable velocity necessary to reach Earth in one month!

I also determined the fuel efficiency of X-COM crafts a while ago. Each ship was sent from my base in northern Mongolia to the north pole for a round-trip of 12,210 miles. The Avenger is the most fuel efficient craft in the game using up 20% of its fuel or 2.4 units of Elerium out of 12 for this mission. On a full tank of 12 units of Elerium, the Avenger could theoretically fly 61,050 miles non-stop. Just to get to Mars, it would use 9553 units of Elerium, and require 796 refuelings! This is assuming that the Avenger gets the same velocity on Earth as in space, which is a bad assumption.

The reason you do not see UFOs carrying huge stockpiles of Elerium on board is because they already do! Each Power Source has 50 units of Elerium to use - the Avenger only has 12 units for 2 engines! This is why the larger UFOs can out-distance the Avenger any day of the week.

The Avenger, with 2 Power Sources, is more fuel efficient than the Firestorm with 1 Power Source - but not by much. The law of deminishing returns must start to apply with craft with 2 or more engines. Most likely, the 2nd engine only adds to the range of the craft and not much to the velocity. The Battleship and Terror Ship have 4 Power Sources and 200 units of Elerium to draw upon. Even with 4 engines, these UFOs get about the same velocity as the Avenger, but the main point is that they can out-range your Avengers without even trying!

Each additional engine beyond the 1st one adds to the range. So with 4 engines, and assuming the same fuel efficiency as the Avenger, the range of the Battleship and Terror Ship should be 1,017,500 miles or roughly 42 times around Earth's equator! WOW!

So to summarize:
All craft probably get way-better velocity and fuel efficiency in space than on Earth. This is because of air friction and the density of air in Earth's atmosphere. In space there is hardly any friction and almost zero density because the molecules are spread so far apart. Also, these craft can keep accelerating in space, whereas on Earth acceleration is capped because of friction and the like. The maximum velocity the game gives is probably the maximum velocity on Earth, not in space - meaning these craft are capable of much higher velocities than shown.  

[JellyfishGreen]

Nicely put, Zombie. The air-friction idea makes the most sense to me, too.

[Psy Guy]

You sure? I know that the battleship is the only craft with 200 E-115. The terror ship has a power supplies on the left and right side of the middle room on the first floor. Out of all the times i played x-com ive never gotten 200 E-115 from a terrorship. Please someone comform this so i don't go insane from the thought that i don't the layout of a terrorship.  :mad:

[Zombie]

Psy Guy - Very rarely are Terror Ships found on the ground and undamaged. Usually they get shot down because it is easier to deal with just aliens than aliens and stupid civilians in a terror mission. In addition, you can recover corpses, weapons, navigational units etc. There are 4 Power Sources arranged in a + (plus) pattern in the center of level 0 equidistant from the central lift by 2 tiles.

The Official Strategy Guide by David Ellis says there is a 70% chance that each Power Source will explode when shot down. Sometimes 1, 2, or even 3 power sources survive the impact, but the chances of all 4 surviving are pretty slim! I have only seen this happen maybe 2 times in all the years I have played this wonderful game! In each of those cases I recovered 200 Elerium-115.

Most often, either all the Power Sources explode, or 2 will remain intact right across from each other. The chances that 1 or 3 will survive are also slim, but greater than all 4 will. The reason you only saw 100 Elerium is because 2 engines survived. I have never seen an "unpowered" engine or only 2 Power Sources in a completely intact Terror Ship. You can also use a game editor for the PC version to "force" the UFO to remain undamaged, and in those cases you can recover 200 Elerium!  

[NKF]

Going aside for a bit:

About the ships, that would probably also explain why the ships are the way they are.

The Lightning, for example, has less acceleration than the Firestorm, although it has the same number of engines and can store the same amount of fuel. It's slower and even with the reduction of one weapon hardpoint, it still needs to compensate for the weight of the troops. If only the game actively modified the speeds of your ships, we'd be able to modify the maximum speeds of the ships merely by adjusting the weight loaded on the ship.

With the Avenger, the additional engine makes up all the difference that the weight and extra hardpoint provides, increases acceleration and doubles the fuel capacity at the same time, giving it more air-time.

Now, just imagine an avenger with four engines, each with a full 50 elerium capacity (ala the battleship). It might be able to get to Mars on its own. I imagine that's what they did with the booster module (see game cover/manual). On the other hand, once you are in space, it doesn't take much propulsion to get you moving. I imagine it's the starts, stops and reentry that would need the most use of the engines.

As for the propulsion of the small scout...er, flatulance? Just kidding. Alien alloys must be very light as well as being very strong. I mean, look at how easily the battleships move about despite its bulk and an un-aerodynamic build. (and if you don't believe in clean-up teams that swoop in, tidy up the area and return to base before your troops start the return trip, then just imagine them folding up a battleship and tucking it away inside a Skyranger! )  

The small scouts probably use a primitive rocket propulsion system that's not worth your effort to research and probably glides a lot.

On the other hand, sometimes it's best not to delve too much into science fiction as it is. It's fiction. It doesn't have to make sense all the time.

- NKF

[Pumpkinhead]

Some other stats that might be useful in this whole discussion is how fast each ship can reach its destination...

Basically, using speed only (I'm not sure how fuel works in the game) each ship can reach any point on the Earth within this amount of time:

Avenger: 2hrs
Firestorm: 2hrs 34min
Lightning: 3hrs 29min
Interceptor: 5hrs 8min
Skyranger: 14hrs 12min

One other thing... At the very moment I'm writing this, Mars is 145 million Nautical Miles from Earth, making an Avenger trip take about 3 years!!

... And THIS is what it looks like!

[Zager]

Yeah, but let's not forget than we probably can't apply atmospheric speeds to space.

[Psy Guy]

Based on the David Ellis strad guide the terror ship has 4 power supplies (4 in the middle room) but only yields 100 E-115. (i checked it at about 2 in the morning and looked like he had the 2 unknown crap as power sources for a total of 6. Probly a typo) I knew i got that number from somewhere.
And with the fact that terrorships hardly ever land without terrorizing a city. (and when they land to do the infiltration missions most people just shoot them down and land at the battleship sites.) I guess ive never seen an undamaged terrorship. (if you look at the layout of the terrorship's reactors. If one goes they all go)

On to the X-COM UFO craft!!

The avenger is the best recreation of alien's anti-grav perpulsion they made. The lightning and firestorm even though they look like UFOs aren't a well made recreations of alien anti-grav designs. The second engine only adds to the force it produces resulting in more speed.

When it comes to space flight all you need is a boost and you can sail for a while. If you ever played any of the Elite games you would know the benefits of quick boosts followed by long periods of engine cut offs, It really saves on fuel when you don't need to manuver. Very low fuel use you can accelerate to mad speeds.

[EclipseDog]

People keep commenting on how outside earth's atmosphere it wouldn't take as much effort to travel since there is no resistance. Okay... umm but wouldn't that make it harder for the aliens since they are relying on gravity and anti-gravity propulsion systems? If there is no gravity to push against exactly how can it move anywhere using a gravity requiring system? Better question.. how come none of you even thought of that?

[Bomb Bloke]

You want elerium, just build a base next to an alien base (preferably floater, in the arctic).

I played through a game of UFO and got about 250 units of elerium, total. Shooting down craft jsut doesn't cut it.