|
Rorahusky posted:I suppose it would be kind of hard to explain to your spouse about how you got all your arms and legs chopped off so you could be turned into a cyborg, or how you're now a mutant freak who can jump five stories with his new mutant legs. Funny note about that - MEC soldiers are one of a half-dozen ways XCOM really loving sucks at the whole secrecy thing in the EU/EW, but presumably the rationale is that after the aliens are all murdered they can release the truth to the world and say "THIS GUY WITH NO ARMS, NO LEGS, AND IS SWIMMING IS NOT 'BOB'. HE IS A HERO. SO SHUT THE gently caress UP."
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 05:28 |
|
|
# ? Mar 28, 2024 18:50 |
|
Rorahusky posted:I suppose it would be kind of hard to explain to your spouse about how you got all your arms and legs chopped off so you could be turned into a cyborg, or how you're now a mutant freak who can jump five stories with his new mutant legs. I don't feel bad for the gene-modded soldiers. After the X-COM project ends, they get to go home and be goddamn superheroes.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 05:38 |
|
Bobbin Threadbare posted:I don't feel bad for the gene-modded soldiers. After the X-COM project ends, they get to go home and be goddamn superheroes. I'd like to think at least one of them gets to be a superpowered stunt double who gets hired to do superhero movies and they save a million bucks on production costs when the guy they film is actually able to leap small buildings in a single bound.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 05:41 |
|
Stunt double nothing. At that point, that joker has more qualifications to be an action hero than Schwarzenegger, Stallone, or Weaver. Just cast them as the star and have them do their own stunts. It's not like you're throwing anything at them that the aliens didn't.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 05:45 |
|
Speedball posted:Personal theory as to the terrible aim of your soldiers: You know how hard it is to get the nations to fund you? It's just as grudging for them to send you competent soldiers. Guava's original X-Com LP is all too appropriate here too: it's a ragtag bunch of misfits in an outfit funded by the lowest bidders. Aim statistics for real life soldiers are incredibly low as soon as enemy fire becomes a thing. Again, remember that supposedly the aliens (and you) are shooting at each other all the time, they just took it out because it looked 'too busy'. In the turn based nature of a game, there's necessarily abstractions like this-but a 25% hit rate against guys in 90% cover is goddamn amazing and most armies would give you literally a billion dollars if you could train guys to shoot that accurately. Coolguye posted:Funny note about that - MEC soldiers are one of a half-dozen ways XCOM really loving sucks at the whole secrecy thing in the EU/EW, but presumably the rationale is that after the aliens are all murdered they can release the truth to the world and say "THIS GUY WITH NO ARMS, NO LEGS, AND IS SWIMMING IS NOT 'BOB'. HE IS A HERO. SO SHUT THE gently caress UP." XCOM is secret presumably not to hide from governments, but to give governments an excuse to not talk about aliens invading on live TV because that kind of sucks, or in the case of China/Japan (and other XCOM members, like Iran and Israel) to not talk about how their governments are actually militarily cooperating, because nobody wants to hear that. That way, a thin veneer of deniability is enough for 'secrecy'. I doubt they're secret secret. So anyone in XCOM would presumably be special forces types assigned to some sort of "long-term experimental warfare" assignment, and if they die it's because they "died in training". Sadly, the body can't be released because he/she was killed by a 2000 pound bomb and even if we did release it to you all it'd do is cause you more trauma so we're very very sorry but you can be assured he/she died a hero."
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 05:56 |
|
I don't really think X-COM is that much of a secret. When aliens attack, a big metal thing flies through the city and drops off a group of 4-6 superhumans who take out the aliens. That's ignoring the (assumed) cleanup crews who collect the alien corpses, weapon fragments, UFO pieces, and assorted baskets of space candy, since the Skyranger can hold 6 soldiers at most. Unless the countries are somehow managing to cover the whole invasion up as an international group of roving cosplayers, I would think that letting the public know of the existence of X-COM would probably help calm them down in the face of imminent destruction by small gray men.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 06:24 |
|
The thing about this game's recruits I'm interested in is the promoted soldiers you pick up from some council requests. The ones who are promoted veterans already. Now, if we take the game at face value, the baseline rookies are SAS, Spetsnaz, Devgru, and the like. The experienced troops only get that way from killing aliens in the field. So, why the hell are these guys? Thinking about, seems the likely story is they're every not-XCom military's few success stories against the aliens. Survived a muton ambush, killed a sectoid, that kinda thing. They're the people whose faces go on the propaganda posters, the total badasses. And in XCOM, they're just more meat for the mill.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 06:25 |
|
Coolguye posted:In the novels that were written about UFO Defense (I have no idea how canon these are supposed to be), there were only two requirements to be a soldier in XCOM: Be willing to disappear from the 'normal' world, and be aware of aliens without us having to tell you (this typically means surviving an alien attack). So a lot of soldiers that you get are presumably dudes who have stories like this: I wonder how hard it would be to mod the game so that any civilian you rescue in a terror mission becomes a rookie, and that's the only source of new rookies.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 06:28 |
|
Pyroi posted:I don't really think X-COM is that much of a secret. When aliens attack, a big metal thing flies through the city and drops off a group of 4-6 superhumans who take out the aliens. That's ignoring the (assumed) cleanup crews who collect the alien corpses, weapon fragments, UFO pieces, and assorted baskets of space candy, since the Skyranger can hold 6 soldiers at most. Unless the countries are somehow managing to cover the whole invasion up as an international group of roving cosplayers, I would think that letting the public know of the existence of X-COM would probably help calm them down in the face of imminent destruction by small gray men. If you stay in the situation room long enough you'll see news tickers talking about how some weird military organization is apparently really good (or not) at saving cities from aliens and look, another sighting in Russia of these guys in strange armor fighting back the alien menace. Plus, the capital cities of the council nations are routinely attacked by ufos with the goal of spreading terror, and XCOM only even found out about it because someone turned on the news. Plus there's that whole thing where XCOM decides that the perfect equipment to bring on a covert op are grenades, rocket launchers, and giant robot men with flamethrowers for arms. What's going on is no secret after all that. RBA Starblade fucked around with this message at 06:41 on Feb 6, 2014 |
# ? Feb 6, 2014 06:37 |
|
Tendales posted:I wonder how hard it would be to mod the game so that any civilian you rescue in a terror mission becomes a rookie, and that's the only source of new rookies. XCOM: Peace Walker? Make sure to Fulton those civvies, Otto, no sense in them getting shot when we could potentially recruit them - even greenest of the green can become battle-hardened after a few passes through that training course we're working on! (Oh god I literally have Peace Walker on the brain today!)
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 06:38 |
|
TwistedSynapse posted:(Oh god I literally have Peace Walker on the brain today!) What hath I wrought? Forgive me, Something Awful!
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 06:40 |
|
MJ12 posted:Aim statistics for real life soldiers are incredibly low as soon as enemy fire becomes a thing. Again, remember that supposedly the aliens (and you) are shooting at each other all the time, they just took it out because it looked 'too busy'. In the turn based nature of a game, there's necessarily abstractions like this-but a 25% hit rate against guys in 90% cover is goddamn amazing and most armies would give you literally a billion dollars if you could train guys to shoot that accurately. quote:XCOM is secret presumably not to hide from governments, but to give governments an excuse to not talk about aliens invading on live TV because that kind of sucks, or in the case of China/Japan (and other XCOM members, like Iran and Israel) to not talk about how their governments are actually militarily cooperating, because nobody wants to hear that. Tendales posted:I wonder how hard it would be to mod the game so that any civilian you rescue in a terror mission becomes a rookie, and that's the only source of new rookies.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 07:27 |
|
Speaking of XCOM fluff, I like to imagine the alien bosses keep their troops in the dark about XCOM as well. Joe Sectoid thinks he's getting an easy assignment abducting some backwater primitives, then steps off the flying saucer to face a squad of power armored troops with heavy plasma rifles.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 08:07 |
|
Psion posted:Just so we're clear you're referring to GuavaMoment here right? I was wondering what was taking you so long to show up. I guess it's because I didn't feel the need to change your avatar for this thread. We should fix that.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 08:09 |
|
Jade Star posted:
If nothing else, I want to see all the haikus people submitted with their applications.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 08:15 |
|
Coolguye posted:The game, in reality, is pretty schizophrenic about it. XCOM's name is certainly not released to the public, as (like others said) the news ticker never references it by name, just 'mysterious group' or whatever. The visibility of some of the alien attacks and the recurring reports of people murdering things and then disappearing means that a lot of reasonable people would suspect something serious is up, but there's hints that the secrecy layer is thin, and others that it's slathered on like butter in a Paula Deen recipe. Again, it's just funnier to think they're supposed to be all Area 51 and Alpha Protocol and they just blow really bad at that part of their jobs. To me it seems like the secrecy is mostly for the sake of preventing alien infiltrators from discovering their base(s). So it's less about X-COM not being a thing at all and more that everyone associated with the project denies their involvement. After all, if everyone gives the same response to questions about X-COM, the aliens won't know who to mind rape, right?
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 08:17 |
|
On the secrecy issue, I think that could be a real thing up till the Terror missions. When the aliens are running through a city killing and destroying as much of it as possible for the sole purpose of causing panic it would be impossible to keep that hidden. You can't put a lid on the things they show in cut scenes. A UFO is hanging out over a major city bombarding it with craft mounted guns and a sizeable chunk on the city population and buildings are not going to be there tomorrow.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 08:46 |
|
I really hate that you never encounter combat capable friendlies, even in places where they should be. There are side missions where you encounter soldiers and bodyguards who just hang out and watch your dudes get shot. Thanks, bro! Even the lowest rookie accuracy is pretty drat good for night fighting while outnumbered with no support. I wish I could have the units use the suppression fire animations against each other when in range. Real firefights tend to involve thousands of rounds going down range. It would be so pretty!
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 09:51 |
|
Huh, I just realized I never did the challenge to complete the game from every landmass. I should get back on board with that as well as try out these new DLC stuff.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 09:54 |
|
Mordaedil posted:Huh, I just realized I never did the challenge to complete the game from every landmass. I should get back on board with that as well as try out these new DLC stuff. I wish that one had a checklist.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 10:06 |
|
Bruceski posted:I wish that one had a checklist. I know I did a game in Asia on Classic, I think I had a game completed from Europe on Normal and I am doing a game from South America on Easy.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 10:11 |
|
So, GuavaMoment, when you said that you consider supports to be the least useful class, could you please expand that argument? Because i really could not agree less.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 12:12 |
|
Yeah. I almost always roll with two supports cause flanking is so easy with them.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 13:06 |
|
Eifert Posting posted:Yeah. I almost always roll with two supports cause flanking is so easy with them. In my last full game, my supports ALWAYS died. It was pretty much like Oldschool X-Com for any support.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 13:11 |
|
I tend to prefer a single support which almost always becomes my prime psion/volunteer. That additional equipment slot really helps with the psi shield.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 13:14 |
|
GuavaMoment posted:Beaten on Chris Kluwe not being some random dude. However I'm some random youtube dude, don't you forget it! Don't fret, Guava. They mention your LP if you go a little deeper: http://www.ign.com/wikis/xcom-enemy-unknown/Otto_Zander Nemo2342 posted:If nothing else, I want to see all the haikus people submitted with their applications. Yeah, I'd like to see this. And the winning pieces of artwork.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 13:14 |
|
So here's a question: can you get a soldier critically wounded so many times he gets 0 will? What happens if you do, does he just instantly panic the moment the enemy opens fire?
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 13:32 |
|
Pyroi posted:I don't really think X-COM is that much of a secret. When aliens attack, a big metal thing flies through the city and drops off a group of 4-6 superhumans who take out the aliens. That's ignoring the (assumed) cleanup crews who collect the alien corpses, weapon fragments, UFO pieces, and assorted baskets of space candy, since the Skyranger can hold 6 soldiers at most. Unless the countries are somehow managing to cover the whole invasion up as an international group of roving cosplayers, I would think that letting the public know of the existence of X-COM would probably help calm them down in the face of imminent destruction by small gray men.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 14:00 |
|
Mordaedil posted:Huh, I just realized I never did the challenge to complete the game from every landmass. I should get back on board with that as well as try out these new DLC stuff. My first go through EW got me the Valkyrie? (4 female soldiers) achievement on the tutorial meld mission. Was convenient if I was an achievement junkie. Now that this is up I might just have to put another run through in.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 14:03 |
|
Tendales posted:I wonder how hard it would be to mod the game so that any civilian you rescue in a terror mission becomes a rookie, and that's the only source of new rookies. Modding the game might be hard, but that would be a pretty easy self-imposed challenge: keep track of how many people you've rescued so far, and that's the maximum number of rookies you allow yourself to "buy".
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 14:43 |
|
Coolguye posted:I believe the XCOM project gets terminated if you lose too many members of the Council in the original XCOM, same as in EU. But there's a lot of lose conditions in UFO, including simply having a negative monthly score for too long, or being in debt two months in a row. I think X-COM remains so long as you have at least a single backer in the original. The rest of it looks right though.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 15:58 |
|
Pvt.Scott posted:Even the lowest rookie accuracy is pretty drat good for night fighting while outnumbered with no support. I wish I could have the units use the suppression fire animations against each other when in range. Real firefights tend to involve thousands of rounds going down range. It would be so pretty! That might be something that Toolboks could eventually bring back if it's anywhere still in the code though.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 15:59 |
|
Coolguye posted:During beta, they did this for a while. The initial burst was just the beginning, if you fired at an alien, your soldier and the alien would exchange fire until the next turn. They eventually scrapped it because it made firefights absurdly loud, busy, and visually distracting while trying to move anyone who's not firing. It looks really cool from a viewer's perspective, but from a player's perspective it's actually pretty inhibiting. Yeah, firefight mode would definitely be a "sometimes" toggle.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 16:02 |
|
Pvt.Scott posted:Yeah, firefight mode would definitely be a "sometimes" toggle. Having it available as a toggle would be nice.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 16:05 |
|
apostateCourier posted:Having it available as a toggle would be nice. I thought what they should have done was make it something that showed up in cinematic camera and/or could be turned on/off via hotkey, to show you who could see who at a glance. So when you zoomed in to a soldier to see them shoot, suddenly everyone's firing guns and ducking behind cover etc etc.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 16:21 |
|
Jade Star posted:I was wondering what was taking you so long to show up. I was too busy telling people about your sandcastle post to notice you'd actually posted the thread.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 17:33 |
|
How does Panic actually work? It never really explains how someone will panic anywhere other than it can happen and sometimes you will shoot your own guys. The mechanics of panicing were a mystery to me.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 18:05 |
|
ZenVulgarity posted:How does Panic actually work? It never really explains how someone will panic anywhere other than it can happen and sometimes you will shoot your own guys. The mechanics of panicing were a mystery to me. Basically, if a soldier gets wounded or killed the game makes a roll which is checked against everyone's will. If they fail the check, they panic and immediately take one action (Moving, hunkering down or shooting a random target). Once they've gotten up a few ranks, panic becomes really rare. Unless someone on the squad dies, which incurs a will penalty on everyone else.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 18:13 |
|
Mutons can also use Intimidate to cause a panic check, but I have never seen that work on anyone besides rookies.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 18:19 |
|
|
# ? Mar 28, 2024 18:50 |
|
Panic chains are always fun on escort missions, when your soldiers inevitably flip their poo poo and unload a clip into the VIP.
|
# ? Feb 6, 2014 18:44 |