Anti Alien Infiltration.

[Zombie]

Every time the aliens do something, they get some points. Hypothetically, say a UFO performs a mission that nets the aliens 15 points. If you were to just shoot down that UFO, it would easily negate those 15 points. Assaulting the UFO would generate more than 10x the points which the aliens did. Usually it's more than this too.

 

It's this scoring discrepancy, which really pains me. Scoring is weighted heavily towards X-COM's side. Sure, your troops could really mess up on a mission - losing soldiers, HWP's, civilians, or even your transport ship if everyone dies. But that's the chance you have to pay on a bad mission. The reverse is true for good missions: you can potentially amass a ton of points if everything goes right.

 

My point is that just shooting down a UFO is always enough to negate the alien activity points generated in that area. Doesn't seem fair to the aliens, now does it? Here again, your craft could potentially be destroyed shooting down a UFO, but it is unlikely with the more powerful craft weapons. Where do the aliens stand with the Plasma Cannon on your side? Way off in the negatives somewhere!

[Blehm 98]

just shooting down a medium scout generates 50 points, and destroying it generates 100. So essentially, that alone gives you a lot of points

then each alien you kill is worth 10 - 60 points, then captures, then equipment, and then...(on and on)

[Jasonred]

just shooting down a medium scout generates 50 points, and destroying it generates 100.  So essentially, that alone gives you a lot of points

then each alien you kill is worth 10 - 60 points, then captures, then equipment, and then...(on and on)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Ah... BUT, you are assuming that you can DETECT every single ship in the game, AND beat em in a firefight.

 

Yes, once you have researched the best tech for yourself, the odds swing wildly into X-com's favour. Plasma Cannons ARE after all the air to air equivalent of Psi. Well, almost.

 

Early on in the game though, your score can go quite badly to the alien's favour, as your interceptor can barely catch up to most craft, and has problems shooting down Terror Ships and upwards. Plus, with only one base, you can't even detect most of the freaking things.

 

If I'm not mistaken, having men killed in combat or MIA is the reverse of alien ships. In that the penalty for losing a man is more than the gain from killing an alien.

 

If you want to keep the aliens on even grounds for longer, limit the number of scientists you allow yourself to hire. THAT will pretty much give the aliens a chance for decent scores for a long long time.

[FullAuto]

Even early on, the points calculation is still in your favour, simply because even when aliens get away with their missions, they earn sod all points compared to successful X-Com actions. Even when the aliens have a base on Earth, it only earns them a point a day (I think). Ok, they can have more than one, but the most I've ever seen is six. Six points per day, for 30 days equals 180 points. What's that? A good UFO recovery mission?

And having SIX alien bases set up is a pretty unusual situation.

The aliens struggle to match X-Com, points-wise, from the very beginning. Even when the aliens carry out a successful terror mission, it doesn't make much of a dent.

[Blehm 98]

Well, the game's debriefing is crap, like i think was said above

you lose and gain points depending on the rank of the soldier/alien who was killed/captured in combat

Yeah, but bases generate a load of alien activity and probably will help a country defect to the alien's side as well

[FullAuto]

AFAIK, the only activity they generate is a visit from a supply ship a few times each month. Which can actually benefit you a lot more, if you have the craft to catch them and shoot them down, never mind actually assaulting them when landed/crashed.

[Zombie]

According to the Official Strategy Guide (or OSG by David Ellis), the aliens score points for these actions:

 

Each UFO that flies over the Earth: 1 point

Each UFO that lands: 2 points

Alien base is built: 50 points

Each day an alien base exists on Earth (per base): 5 points

Ignored Terror site: 1000 points

Aliens sign a pact with a country: 150 points

Successful harvest mission: 30 points

Successful abduction mission: 50 points

 

The points the aliens collect are subtracted from your score on a semi-instantaneous basis and this total is then reflected on the SCORE screen (found in the GRAPHS tab in the Geoscape). So these points values I list are actually negative when used in a score calculation.

 

If you noticed, for each day a single (1) alien base exists on Earth they get 5 points. Multiply that by 30 days (an average month in X-COM time) and you could potentially be looking at 150 points. That number is nothing to sneeze at when a single successful Medium Scout assault by your troops will net you that (and more).

 

I have been doing some intense testing in the past couple of days to see if the aliens can infiltrate every country and win in that regard. (According to my preliminary results, Russia cannot be infiltrated in the CE version of X-COM so losing the game by this method is impossible).

 

Anyways, to keep the government(s) happy I left every alien base that the aliens constructed intact and just went after the Supply Ships instead. That gave me some decent points (~ +8000 to +10000 points per month). Right now, I have 26 alien bases on Earth, and I assume there are a few more which I haven't detected yet. Multiply 26 bases by 5 points per day by 30 days in a month, and the minimum number of points lost per month to the aliens is -3900!

 

As a side note, I was looking intently at the score screen and noticed a hefty chunk of my points just vanished at the end of each day. Turns out that this was the alien bases still around Earth. (26 bases * -5 points per base per day = -130 points). So this calculation is performed at the end/start of each day and this is then reflected in your score. Kinda hard to impress any countries left when there is a constant drain of -130 points every day. Even with shooting down every supply ship my 1 base detected, I was barely able to keep up. To get the regulated +8000 to 10000-point positive score, I needed to go after pretty much everything that flew.

 

I'll try to grab some screenies to show you guys when I get some time. All those pink squares on Earth really are pretty to look at!

 

- Zombie

[NKF]

As far as I can remember, the game has a limit to the total number of everything that can be on the Geoscape at any given time. If I remember correctly, it was something like 50i cons - including bases, your ships, alien bases, UFOs and X-Com waypoints.

 

So Zombie, what's your total count of everything on the Geoscape now, barring UFOs and ship waypoints? (Include docked interceptors and troop carriers)

 

Just think of it as a side-experiment to your current experiment. It would be interesting to know what will happen once you hit 50 items on the Geoscape and what would happen to incoming UFOs and what would happen to the purchasing/building of new aircraft and waypoint plotting.

 

- NKF

[Blehm 98]

wait, if you buy an extra interceptor will a base be deleted, a ship or xcom base be deleted, the above gets put into storage until space is cleared up, or will it crash the game... interesting question

 

lol, this reminds of a bug in XCOM 3 that lets you go above the ninth level(two levels past it) on UFO levl 5 transport i think(ice cream cone kind)... my guys were so high up that the level indicator just disappeared

both involve going over limits so im guessing that the game will probably just make space and maybe slow down a little bit

[FullAuto]

26 alien bases seems like a bit of an extreme situation.

[Zombie]

So Zombie, what's your total count of everything on the Geoscape now, barring UFOs and ship waypoints? (Include docked interceptors and troop carriers)

Well, there are approximately 26 alien bases present (may be more since I haven't sent out a Skyranger to patrol the Earth to detect more). Additionally, I have one X-COM base built with 3 ships docked there. That's it. So, adding them up we get about 30 icons. Still a bit off of 50 yet.

 

Perhaps I need to patrol some more and to also build 7 more bases with 6 ships per base. That should put me way past the limit.

[Accounting Troll]

On another now seemingly defunct X-Com forum, I was told that it is impossible for the aliens to win by infiltrating all 16 funding nations - one nation will refuse to sign a pact with the aliens no matter what. Whether they regard supporting X-Com as the best way to fight the aliens is another matter.

 

However I don't know if this is true. I heard it second or third hand, and I have never tested this hypothesis.

[Blehm 98]

what was this xcom board....

[Zombie]

On another now seemingly defunct X-Com forum, I was told that it is impossible for the aliens to win by infiltrating all 16 funding nations - one nation will refuse to sign a pact with the aliens no matter what.  Whether they regard supporting X-Com as the best way to fight the aliens is another matter.

 

However I don't know if this is true.  I heard it second or third hand, and I have never tested this hypothesis.

Many people claim that Russia is the only country which will not switch sides. I am testing this scenario out right now and indeed, Russia is the lone-holdout. It will not switch sides even after I gain a ton of points in a month. I'm unsure if Russia is the default country which will refuse to switch sides or if any country will take on this role (assuming it is one of 2 countries left). My gut feeling says that Russia is unique.

 

For instance, say all but two countries (India and China) have signed pacts with the aliens. If China falls, India should be the country which will not switch sides (or visa versa). So far, Russia is the only country which will do this. I'm gonna need to test this scenario out some more to verify the validity, but all fingers seem to point as Russia being the only culprit.

 

- Zombie

[Blehm 98]

Perhaps russia is so cold the aliens don't like it there

 

hmm, actually, maybe the game is designed so that you cannot lose that way, that seems like something developers would put in, just because it seems logical to me

[NKF]

Zombie, when losing the countries, did you notice any pattern in how many countries you had to lose at any given time (or perhaps a percentage of them) before you are forcibly shut down? Or have the countries only withdrawn through infiltration as opposed to withdrawing out of disgust?

 

- NKF

[Accounting Troll]

blehm - it was the X-Com Acopalypse Source at www.dwcs.net The person who runs it hasn't had time to update things for a while.

 

Zombie - if Russia is unique, maybe it is because it is the one funding nation that sprawls across two geographical zones. Perhaps the aliens don't know how to begin infiltrating Russia. I can't think of any other logical reason why Russia should be any harder to infiltate than the USA.

 

I think I'll run the same experiment - if the country that refuses to sign a pact is selected entirely at random there is only a 1 in 16 chance that it will be Russia.

[Zombie]

Zombie, when losing the countries, did you notice any pattern in how many countries you had to lose at any given time (or perhaps a percentage of them) before you are forcibly shut down? Or have the countries only withdrawn through infiltration as opposed to withdrawing out of disgust?

In my trials I never had any more than three countries sign pacts with the aliens in any given month. My impression is that having multiple countries turn in the same month cannot shut you down. (Well, unless you count the negative impact, that is. See, if you had a "bad" month prior, then a couple bad months in a row is grounds for X-COM's immediate disbandment).

 

Every month I completed in this "test game" had a positive score. A very positive score. So I would have to say that the reason that the countries were signing pacts were because of infiltration, instead of general unhappiness. As a rule, countries probably can only switch sides via infiltration rather than lack of X-COM activity. I say "probably" because I never saw this happen. Some more testing might be in order...

 

Zombie - if Russia is unique, maybe it is because it is the one funding nation that sprawls across two geographical zones.  Perhaps the aliens don't know how to begin infiltrating Russia.  I can't think of any other logical reason why Russia should be any harder to [infiltrate] than the USA.

 

I think I'll run the same experiment - if the country that refuses to sign a pact is selected entirely at random there is only a 1 in 16 chance that it will be Russia.

You know, Stewart mentions all the time that Russia is unique because of geography. You two might be right. But I can attest that the aliens know that Russia exists and probably can infiltrate it. However, this might just be a bug at this point.

 

As for Russia supposedly having an equal chance of being the "last" country standing... According to statistics the countries should all have a 1 in 16 chance. But this ignores a myriad of differing factors, including base placement, activity points, possibly geography, and even the number of remaining countries still signed up with X-COM.

 

To test out each of these distinct scenarios would be next to impossible because you cannot totally eliminate all the other variables present. Sure, we may be able to ignore one variable by placing the initial base in the same location in every test, but what would happen if that base were located somewhere else? There are still at least 15 variables for location still present.

 

I have a sneaking suspicion that Russia is preselected to be one of the two countries left standing. And quite possibly (because of something) it is the last one to remain untouched by alien infiltration. (When was the last time you saw an alien infiltration vessel bound for Russia? When was the last time you saw an alien infiltration vessel land in Russia? I haven't seen either).

 

- Zombie

[Blehm 98]

perhaps the developers forgot about russia? i mean, it is completely possible that they happened to either forget about russia(you know, you remember everything but on thing then remember later) or they weren't sure about it since the game was being made around the time after USSR collapsed, so... yeah

[Zombie]

I was doing some more testing, trying to get Russia to reduce it's funding down to $0. Sadly, this isn't possible as my latest trials have Russia sitting firm at $4000. Since funding levels for countries go up or down by a maximum of 20%, and only factors of 1k are shown, then the 20% of $4000 ($800) cannot be taken into account. Still, this was a fascinating test to run. Hmmm... I might just have to use a certain game editor to reduce Russia to $0 manually and watch what happens!

 

During the month of August 2002 (X-COM time), I purposefully got a terrible score to try and get Russia to reduce its commitment by 20%. Needless to say, I succeeded, as my score was -1649. Since Russia was the last country still funding X-COM, I should have seen a drop of 20%.

 

Take a look at this screenshot I took for one particular end-of-month report in August 2002:

 

See anything strange? My funding change went up by $230,000, and yet the project was still cancelled due to consecutive bad months!

 

The main thing that startled me was that Russia increased it's funding, despite the bad score. How could this happen, though? Well, you have to remember that since Russia could not be infiltrated, there was essentially 0 alien activity in that country. No alien activity = no X-COM activity there either. Since that country gave a positive increase, a score difference of at least +1 point happened between the aliens and X-COM. Substituting the information into the formulas that the OSG gives yields an equation which looks like this:

(Overall X-COM activity/10) - (Overall Alien activity/5) = +1

Multiplying 10 to each side and the equation now looks like this:

(Overall X-COM activity) - 2(Overall Alien activity) = 10, or

(Overall X-COM activity) = 2(Overall Alien activity) + 10

Somehow, my total activity (though low) was still better than the aliens total activity multiplied by 2!

 

The other possible scenario which could have happened is that I inadvertently shot down a Supply Ship over Russian territory. This would add 400 points to my score for Russia automatically, and therefore push the tide in my favor. Interesting... I don't remember even coming near that country during routine interceptions.

 

- Zombie

[Zombie]

I was doing some research this week and kept noticing that infiltration UFO's are almost always sent after an alien base has been built in the area. And if a base was laid first, you are too late to stop anything.

 

However, sometimes alien bases are not found. If this is the case, you stand a chance of successfully stopping the attempt by shooting down all the vessels and visiting the battleships.

 

I suspect this is what happens:

The aliens send a reconnaissance scout to survey a potential country first. Sometimes this ship slips past your radar (especially if you only have standard detection, or the country is in an area not covered by an X-COM base). This scout lands and initiates contact with said country. An alien base is then constructed. Now here comes the slew of infiltration UFO's. These UFO's are probably not infiltrating anything; rather, they are around because the country will allow the aliens to conduct activity unhindered. It's too late to do anything now.

However, if you catch that first scout the alien base might not be built. If this is the case, then shooting down the infiltration fleet might prevent the country from "turning".

 

This is still just mostly theory at the moment, with only a couple of attempts to back it up.

 

- Zombie

[FullAuto]

And if a base was laid first, you are too late to stop anything.

 

I just lost China like this. Zero UFO activity, base pops up, discovered by accident, end of the month, goodbye one billion Communists.

 

However, if you catch that first scout the alien base might not be built. If this is the case, then shooting down the infiltration fleet might prevent the country from "turning".

 

Can be tricky. Both infiltration and base building involve the aliens sending sizable fleets, and stopping them, even with good craft, can be difficult. I've often found you have to stop 100% of the alien fleet or the base/infiltration happens anyway. A bit frustrating when you've dropped two battleships, a supply ship and a terror ship and a scout lands and gets it done.

[Fishfins]

I lost the USA to the aliens a year back. I shot down every scout craft that came into either a great lake of Canada or the sea, then captured the battleships that landed. Still lost USA.

 

Ah well, at least Russia's always on my side.

[Pete]

I'm fairly sure you'd actually have to shoot down every battleship before it landed. Even then I'm not convinced it would work. The massive amount of UFO's that converge when a country intends to sign over is just a visual aid I think. They'll do it anyway

[FullAuto]

You might be right there, Pete. I don't really know. By the time I've got to the point where I can stop a fleet like that, I can stop them all. It's rare that I'm caught at a point where I can only stop some of them.