Alex_D

(this is a good topic to come back from lurking, so I bite) All depends. That reminds me of the case of a very pretty girl who worked as our front desk for over a year. Seriously, some questions: How old is she? How old are you? Do you know she's a bf/hb? Does she particularly smiles more at you than the others? Does she genuinely laughs at your jokes? Does she looks at you as another staff, as a "friend", or as a potential mate? (The last one is if she subtely "checks" you). Depend of the answers. You already told she's not a airhead, and she's pretty and . So she knows the approaches of the most "cocky" guys, and probably is tired of them. And it's not uncommon she may go for a "shy" guy. Be yourself, and by that, mean it. However that doesn't mean you would not stop being corteous. Be sweet, smooth, but still manly. Wear clean clothes and be well groomed. Assuming she's w/o bf/hb, to see if there's a chance, try talking to her in the next workplace's social gathering, bring some other coming social event (movie, play, etc) and just plain ask her out to accompany you as like this "Would you like to go with me to see this *etc*?". That's for testing the waters. To build up confidence and perhaps to get her attention as a potential mate, I'd suggest a unorthodox and (depending of how much do you make, expensive but certainly fun) approach: Get a escort that is prettier or more voluptuous than her and spend a few sessions (on different days) to "warm" up your pheromones and to get her advice. The rest is up to you. Alex

Real life X-Com Sub Craft http://gizmodo.com/5059668/darpa-working-o...from-air-to-sea It's still a project, but who knows, maybe the whole X-Com is actually real.

Those ruins look very clear . More rubble is needed to simulate a battle torn city.

I just noticed something funny after finishing my first game (in a long time) in Superhuman level That there's only one city layout per difficulty level, and we only change the starting location of the first base. That's it if we only play in superhuman, the map is always the same. Did I got it right or I need new glasses? I hope the similarities of each game end there. For some reason Transtellar always get allied with the Aliens , hence my OBG rule.

Well, it's possible to use it but nothing happens

And IIRC in Xcom 1 and 2 the medkit had some drugs to "add" some the energy lost in such way. However I don't see anything like this in Apoc. I once thought that the psy-clone will have such similar effect. Does it?

Now I am playing a game with one self imposed restriction: only one base. Fortunately the base layout I got was the big rectangular box so I have enough real state to put large facilities and their living facilities. For that I have two for soldiers exclusively, that's it for 20 of them. Any non-injured servicemen (human, hybrid or android) are divided in two teams loaded on their ready to go vehicles. They are basically (as of this stage of the game): The "anti-alien" team (6-9 soldiers) armed with double shields, toxigun, and cloaking device; and the "raid" team (9-12 soldiers), armed with two disruptor cannons, heavy rocket launchers and other explosive stuff. Each have suffix tags on their names to indicate their speciality. In battle they are divided in triads. The "anti-alien" team have a plasma pistol as an additional sidearm just in case there is a raid of non-aliens in the base. They all have motion detectors, stunt grenades and one incendiary grenade. My next step is to mod the game to make the hand weapons a bit more realistic and much more powerfull. Maybe changing the toxigun for a toxirifle (larger, heavier, but much more precise and with better range), and to increase the power and ROF of the alien guns.

What I dislike a lot is resorting them prior to each battle. I normally take teams of 6 to 9 soldiers for alien and raid missions respectively, arranged in triads. So, to have them already sorted by speciality I pick these in the same order as in the equipment screen. Once I have reach the right number of scientist (so no internal slots used there, where better scientists replace older ones) then I "force" the soldiers to fit the sequence to fit the triads I use.

It would be far more challenging if there were a negative score for each civilian killed from either friendly or enemy fire, like Xcom I or II. Who can say stunt grenade?

Good advice NKF. I didn't knew about BS not chasing androids. I thought they do hatch on all types of soldiers. And about picking stuff, I also pick and throw back the CoS nades throw at my soldiers. Sometimes it works I personally save my games at different stages of the game, but mostly to keep a backup due to the unreliable performance of Apoc over Win Xp or Win 2K (it crashes), or even when some bugs appear such as the 65535 items bug in the general stores, which disrupt everything.

If you think that's high octane, then check this http://drawmohammed.com/ Warning: Some are really offensive.

Wait until College arrives, the fun continues

Hello to everybody. It has been a long time since my last post. My question is if there is any correlation between the number of available scientists and/or their skills versus the relations of major corporations towards X-Com?

This apparent ineficiency of the sniper rifle made me think. I was playing Apoc with some weapons modified. One of the first things I modded, to balance the game was a more powerful sniper rifle. Kind of a .50 cal today's one. Very powerful, more precise but heavy and slow to reload (I left that one unchanged). Interesting effect. Do you play Apoc modded? Greetings Alex

and how high you are suppose to hover to be inmune to brainsuckers? I remember a time when a popper ran towards my squad. It was all full of smoke I think, and I dispersed them. But the closest guy to the popper was wearing Marsec, so I sent him two levels up. The popper suddenly stopped without exploding, right below my guy, which terminated him after he reached his final position. The others were taking cover. So in general, poppers are a nuissance only if they appear suddenly. I agree, the biggest annoyance is maybe a vortex mine, maybe not thrown to me but those attached to the dead alien bodies (after they fall). They launched dimension missiles, and I need just one to trigger a chain reaction. Very bad, very bad Greetings Alex

Yesterday I saw "Immortel (ad vitam)" (2004) and I was impressed. Although it was my first exposure to the french comic series, I noted its quality in special effects, from which alone, the movie is worthy to watch. Since this movie was made in Europe, maybe some of you saw it. Obviously it is NOT an x-com movie, nor an apocalypse movie, but the diverse items on screen does give a small feeling of megaprimus, or how'd be the life there without x-com and the alien menace (and minus other details). Now spoiler alert for those who have not seen the movie: First the year, apoc was in 2084 aprox, Immortel was in 2090. Second, the first thing that made me think on apoc, the flying cars. Almost like I was seeing the (some rusted) Phoenix Cars all over the place. Third, a pyramid on the sky. It was part of the plot of the movie but imagined how three could have been on the skies of megaprimus. Fourth, the corporation's vendetta. There was something like megapol, the government, and one that was a mixture of sanctuary and nanotech (eugenics), also the subworld of the mutant alliance and SELF (here as humans vs hybrids vs cyborgs). If there's ever a movie based on x-com apoc, this could give an idea of the visuals to be. Any comments to this almost off-topic subject? Greetings Alex

But with the exception of Robots, all the soldiers benefit from training (psy or gym) except for those that are away in a mission, and only while the mission lasts. Regarding this, is it really important not to send those soldiers for a mission when midnight approach, so they will be at base and will receive the full benefits from training? You can always send more troops in that stage so to avoid being overgunned. For me, the high priority in the early game is to capture alive and research every single alien possible, so the Toxigun type "A" is also researched. This has the benefit that when Personal Shields are introduced, they are easily captured because I'm in "stunt" mode instead of "assassin/demolition" mode . In this way I got the PS as a working item long before the aliens introduce their puny entropy launcher Greetings Alex

And speaking of team sizes, they regularly vary from 4 to 12 men. Then my question is, how many men you regularly keep at the "strike" base, either human, robots or hybrids? My number is 20 or less. Until the development of the personal shield, the turnover rate is very high :dead:. If I have more than 10 injured, I transfer the remained woundeds to the secondary base, where a medical facility is built always. Greetings Alex

Now you mention it, I don't recall any instance where an alien throwed one above me and I got damage (I recall plenty of mines landing below me ) However I do recall roofs being destroyed because of Vortex Mines. I guess they are very weak. Greetings Alex

Exactly. These were my first thoughts when I saw it happening. Same happens when used in the city buildings, know I am raiding CoS every 10 game-minutes Greetings Alex

What I hate most, is when wearing my classic late-game suit (disruptor armor, marsec torso, 2 shields), and in a very close-combat situation, the aliens like to "die" so close that the Vortex Mines they were carrying, are ignited by the dimension missiles they fired from behind. They are three or four VM going off plus the initial damage of the DM, almost a killing, and no equipment to recover Alex

I know the stats of the VM are somewhat higher than the HE. But the other day, I was assaulting one of the Alien Dimension Buildings, and I do like to demolish these orange pads to prevent further alien reinforcements. Well, I had a surplus of HE that I took with me to the mission, thinking it may do the trick too (It's funny, I never used HE for the same task before, always did with VM). What happened is I destroyed the pads, no problem, but I noticed, that unlike the VM, the HE left a small hole into the ground, and when I finished all four pads, I got a massive digging instead. What do you think? Was it just a coincidence, or both are supposed to leave craters in the floor? It seems to me, when VM are researched, HE are obsolete, or not? By the way, in the last mission (Alien Gates) the pads are green and not orange, my question is if can you destroy them? Greetings Alex

I'd say that and also the annoying swarm of brainsukers/multiworms going after you. The idea is to have two teams of 3, each facing opossite directions. In that way, at least one team will spot the pooper on time to counteract. Another way is to have one member of the team (of 4) to carry a heavy rocket launcher, set to no-fire until the pooper appears. Since the aliens trend to move faster and run, you always end pursuing them, then the use of marsec mines or boomeroids are somewhat more important to protect certain corridors. But the problem is, almost always the pooper strike first. I prefer to camp with my people with cover ready to reduce the blast. Things change when the toxigun and the shield are researched. After that, it's alien hunt season open, at least until the massive use of vortex mines of part of the aliens. I hate when the first thing they do is to throw THREE of them to your team. That means blood spilled. Greetings Alex

yes, I wrote it here first

As I posted in the other thread, I made myself, the toxigun bigger (3x1), heavier and a bit more accurate (just a little bit more). Also I made the disrupton gun smaller (3x1), altering in all cases the pictures of the equipment screen to fit the new sizes more logically. If you want a challenge, make the disruptor cannon (used by them) more accurate and/or with a higher ROF. If more challenge is wanted, a more powerfull dimension missile is the way. It seems the aliens like to use them "in mass" against you. Greetings Alex