Kret

According to the wiki, TFTD also has an Examination Room

As you've stated, it is rare that a "no-armored" unit will survive from a single plama shot, so I prioritize other topics. When I do get around at reasearching it, I normally produce 1-3 of them at each base as they can be tossed around fairly easy.

Then, there's the mutual surprise rule which overrides any reactions that might of triggered. This is why I usually keep my ufo door ambushing soldiers at max visual distance from the door and placing them within the blind spot of aliens exiting the ufo. Except for crashed or landed ufos, I don't really rely much of reaction fire as the aliens are everywhere.

Maybe you should add a rocket launcher or two with large rockets. They are usefull when the cyberdisc is out of reach from high explosives aswell as when they fly about. Just make sure the launcher is never loaded when ending your turn and that all the rocket ammo is either carried by someone else or stored at the skyranger. That should prevent unwanted reaction shots aswell as undesireable mindcontrolled shots. BTW, I think it is best if you throw the two smoke grenades at the ramps in the 1st turn aswell as in the interior of the skyranger.

I have no idea then. Does the bottom window log give any kind of information that might help finding something about the "special mission"?

Ah, the mission described there is a defense mission that usually triggers when you try to build/upgrade a mine or radar station in a territory adjacent to a hostile faction as they'll attack the construction site. Nothing to do with the surprise attacks.

This is more a bug related to the game marking as captured a different unit type than the one that was the target in the mission. Nothing to do with the space available in the UFO boot.

These missions are usually related to the gates the Beast Men use to reach mars and a couple of other late game missions. I'm not sure what you mean by 'radar missions'. Could you point to one of those threads that talk about these? So far I can only think of a defense mission done at a build radar station, but they aren't any different than other missions except for the map used.

Games that use bink video install such file in the game's particular installation directory as each game uses a given version of the file, so registering the file into the system32 folder is a bad idea as it could cause other games to stop working properly or not to play some videos. Where did you download the binkw32.dll file from? Does the game's installation folder contain the file? On a side note, shouldn't we move this thread? I don't see the relation of S2, S3 or H&S with Age of empires.

Complex topics take longer than difficult ones. As an example here's the following: Alien biology appears as "Difficult" and has a timetodevelop of 23 Life support appears as "Complex" and has a timetodevelop of 91

If you're getting a similar problem in the tactical then either you're facing a completely different bug here, or two different ones.

You get the warp canons from earth and some extra ammo for starting earth weapons in the 1st shipment. You may ask for the 2nd shipment after doing the two moon missions and completing the research that the artefacts recovered from them unlocks. You should get a thank you message and shortly after a diplamacy message saying that such request should be succesfull

Yes, but it's not time based. If you click on empty space in the planetary view when you have no vehicle outside the base the game will go into a loop trying to find one to center on, giving the impression it has hanged. This can also be triggered from the overview screen if you try to click on a territory and the area you've click would match empty space of the globe view. This bug has appeared only in the 1.5 version of the game as the new vehicle centering feature was added. Basically, for the time being, be carefull when clicking in the globe view screen as the game will stop responding to other user commands and your only option to close the program is through the task manager and in some cases a full reset of the machine.

Have you recieved the second ship from earth yet?

Well, I'm a bit more relaxed with the explanation as the vehicle is still out of base which is the important thing.

This is just getting confusing, could you clarify if after recalling the vehicle you waited for it to return to base or you just cancelled it's jobs but the vehicle was still out when you tried clicking on Icaria?

Hmm... I though it could of been related with the vehicle centering bug introduced in 1.5, but this bug doesn't cause a crash as it simply goes into an infinite loop. But if you say it crashes then I'm problably wrong about the cause. Just in case, do try it. One note, when you sort the list by crystal resources, is Icaria the 1st one in the list? and where do you click? The name on the left, or some other part?

It's not something exclusive to Icaria, nor any territory in particula but under your current situation it makes it seem so. Let me guess, does the music continue playing? If so, try sending any vehicle out before checking the list and see what happens. you don't need it to go far, just let a couple of game minutes go by so the vehicle leaves the base and then retry your actions

Check the Experience section of the wiki under Technical Information.

If by "original" reticulans you mean the 1st ones you encounter and thus are the rebel faction then, have you destroyed the main base of the Expedition? This should of unlocked some research topics required for game progress. I believe you can also unlock this after capturing a Exp Commander unit. The plasma technologies aren't necessary to complete the game, but you'll missout on some equipment that these topics open up.

That's true. If it gets into the public market then they'll sell it at novelty prices meaning that your standard hard drives will be much cheaper even if they're more expensive to produce. Still, I'm glad progress is still being made for better, faster and more reliable storage systems.

Do you have enough weapons to fill all the turret slots? 1 for single slot turrets, 2 for double slot turrets and 4 for quad-turrets. You'll also need the same ammount of ammo available for loading the turret weapons aswell as for reloads.

Yup, melee does work, but if the martian are carrying their own melee or plasma weapons it's a bit too risky to charge in closequarters. Best bet is to use throwing knives in their "throwing mode" for those dangerous encounters.

Can you specify what's not working? Does the armour appear in the list or not at all? If it appears, does it allow placing the armour on a Expedition Ret? There's probably some other file that needs modifying before it works.

Basically, some of the creatures you're fighting ARE "technology", genetically designed for certain tasks while others are an "infant" stage of the humanoid aliens.