So just make medkits restore health on mission, but that health shouldn’t transfer outside of mission.
Yeah that would be an easy fix, and it’s also what Firaxis did with their games,; if Snapshot does this then I’d be happy. I do think med kits feel like health potions and are too effective but I guess that’s a consequence of being limited to 8 man squads against hordes. I’d prefer larger squad sizes but weaker healing and skills, which is more like the original XComs. I guess it’s the design route they took.
In Apocalypse I think you could have a maximum of 36 soldiers on a mission and you would expect to lose people often on missions. I’m not saying they should go to massive deployment limits like Apocalypse but 8 feels far too small - they’ve basically copied the Firaxis small squads of superheroes.
Believe me I’d also prefer this. But I’m not sure if development will ever go this way. I’m not sure even if in my mod about balance and nerf to almost everything it would be wise to increase count of soldiers deployed. It (larger squads and perhaps bigger enemy horde) would require a lot of additional balancing and I’m not sure if maps could take so vast amount of units to not feel overcrowded.
And with greater numbers comes longer turns… So, well, I’m not so convinced if my and your desire expressed above is wise in game terms.
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Yeah it’s not likely they’ll go with large squad deployments, Apocalypse handled this through a kind of semi realtime mode and soldiers acting semi independently - I loved XCOM Apocalypse, it was my favourite of this genre by a large margin.
I think they could increase squad sizes to 12 (or 8 plus 1 or 2 vehicles) as a small increase, the original games’ skyranger transport could carry 14 troops, and that was your starting vehicle. If they made med kits and abilities less powerful then the game would be better in my opinion. As it is, you end up with tiny squads of Doom Guys and I never liked this aspect of Firaxis’ games - I was disappointed that Snapshot chose to copy this.
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Sheepy’s Unlimited Deployment mod allows you to take more troops & vehicles on a mission. The max I’ve managed is 9 Squaddies + 2 Vehicles, which does not overload the system, but I think you can swap out a Vehicle for another 3 Squaddies if you wanted.
It’s only worth doing, though, if you self-nerf your squad’s skill uses. Otherwise, spamming skills like there’s no tomorrow just makes the whole thing boringly easy.
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Thanks for that heads up, I’ll check it out. I think the self-nerf could simply be not to multi-class soldiers and limit deployments to up to 2 transports, so 16 with 2 blimps, but they’re far too slow anyway.
I think solo class soldiers aren’t OP, it’s when they get access to a 2nd soldier class that things get silly with power combos.
Many interesting insights - I agree with most of these, although there is a stamina mechanism. It’s barely visible and poorly explained, but still.
Not so sure about that. A solo-classed Assault with Dash and Rapid Clearance is pretty OP, especially when backed up by Rally. As is a Rally-supported Heavy with Jet Jump and Rage Burst. Try fielding a squad with 4 or 5 Rallying support troops and tell me which of the other solo classes rushing around the map and then getting their APs back isn’t OP.
What makes these combos OP is the fact that you have no Cooldowns, so you can repeat them for as long as you have ways of regenerating APs. Rapid Clearance can do that in a damn-near infinite feedback loop if your Squaddie can deal enough damage. And as I say, a handful of Squaddies Rallying everyone else can make for a very powerful set of combos.
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There is no end to the combos one can create to make specific missions OP. It all depends on one’s play style, what troops they have available, the map layout, the enemy combo, the enemy position. etc. It could just be my play style, but these “super OP” missions don’t happen very often.Then again, I create a balanced squad with the goal to be ready for any of the possibiltes - not just the 1 perfect means to tackle 1 or 2 specific mission encounters (which is not known when first deploying one’s squad).
We appear to be in a no win situation. One can’t improve their squad based on the game mechanics, because if they do, the game is ruined. And if they don’t, they end up overpowered by an OP enemy. Obviously, Snapshot has created a broken game (at least for those who’s goal is to maximize any and all loop-holes).
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Yeah I know there’s a stamina mechanic, I just think it could be expanded upon to force more squad rotation later in the game
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Yeah I know there’s still scope for combos between classes but it’s far more noticeable with multi-classes. Skills like dash, return fire, and rally will probably get dialled back at some point but those skills are more full on when paired with other classes. Given how the odds are so stacked against the player in many regards, I currently see the soldier skills as something you have to use in order to win. I like this game for many reasons but I don’t like some of the game design decisions
Oh one important question @UnstableVoltage. Do you have plans to change flight system on geoscape along all above mentioned mechanic updates? Because right now strategic part is a bit of lacking and managing missions and transports is not really a thing that can engage players somehow. I’m currently working on how game could be reworked to make it more interesting and give each decision some meaning. I have quite a lot of it but few points are related to aircraft flights (there are also points about range, crew, resting and healing soldiers onboard, cargohold, attached modifications - but that is not point of this post):
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aircrafts should become more essential (there will be more to transport) - I think that their cost and build time can stay quite high, but allow to find damaged Manticores in bases (at least 3 of them should have one unit stored in hangar) so having few transports would be natural order during advancement (to have more than 4 you need to build or steal them).
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allow for unrestricted flight after pressing ctrl (to any given point on the globe - that could be difficult to program as we would need to have precise form of pointing destination, and distinguish landmass from bodies of water - but alien bases somehow make that distinction so maybe there is proper method in the game) and emergency refueling like it was in earlier builds - current system is so unrealistic (especially instant reset of flight range no matter if you are near alien base or wherever)
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refuelling should take 0.5 h in havens and our bases and like 1 hour in the terrain, and when done in mist area it should be prone to ambush dropship mission (new type), what more - in allied havens it should be done for free (and only there), anywhere else (including our bases) for 25 materials (or equivalent of 5 tech or 25 food in havens if they will agree to trade - options in haven screen)
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while designating destination game should calculate:
a) default - fastest route through havens and bases (exclude all scavenge and exploration sites, alien bases and hostile havens - as they would work just like open terrain stops) without free-flight if possible, because refuelling there is faster,
b) when pressing ctrl - shortest route using only free-flight with 1 hour stops for refuelling in open terrain,
c) when pressing shift - cheapest way based on allied havens where possible and accompanied with free-flight,
and for each of methods: a, b or c show estimated time of flight and cost -
there should be also options saved for each aircraft to:
a) include/omit mist areas where refuelling would take place (safe paths option) which could come in handy if our cargo need to stay out of harm’s way
b) enable/disable automatic refuel on the route (cost saving option) which could come in handy when pressed with resources
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