What I meant with exploitable is that this doesn’t have an end, a limit, as trading values don’t change as you trade like in the real world. You can keep trading at a profit with just one aircraft and one soldier, which breaks the game and is boring just like the raiding exploit.
The snowball effect from more aircraft in the beginning is key, while not an exploit. Maybe there could be a well explained but artificial wall that made having new aircraft only possible after, let’s say, 2 weeks. At least when using the tutorial? This way 1st time players would get the “intended” experience? Not really a fan of the idea, just throwing it around.
I agree, it does feel like an exploit more than anything else. And you don’t need the soldier to trade.
IMO, if you are going to have trading as a game system you need to have some risks and opportunity costs, e.g. changes in price that will make the trade unprofitable, piracy, etc.
Otherwise the player should always trade at a loss.
BTW, I think that’s the way it used to be and suddenly it was changed, but I might be wrong.
That is all true also for me, I can only agree here
The only real ‘cost’ for trading is ingame time and for that what you can get it is simply to low.
On the other side it is the only way to get the highly needed resources without to attack the factions (raid them).
What will happen if you make all these ways to gain many resources in a short time more difficult, more risky, with more opportunity costs?
I think then the pace of the game has to be reduced. Actually I feel pretty overwhelmed when I not go one of these ways to get air crafts and more teams ASAP.
Oh yes, absolutely. Have you ever pressed the fast forward button on the Geoscape?
It should on average take 6 months to beat the game, not 6-9 weeks, and if you ask me it should be possible to do less tactical missions. I’m really looking forward to the next big update that should have stats & memorial for PX operatives [I say next big update because it appears as “in progress” on Canny], to see how many missions I’m actually doing.
I’ve a ticket on canny to slow down the campaign pace too
I’ve never done a raid or abused trading, and that’s why I find resources very scarce and the game pace too fast. It’s a mad run to scramble 4 aircraft and 2 teams by february and not lose the game in the long run. I don’t know if you guys remember a post I made a while ago (probably on the heavy weapons discussions) where I said I had to focus firstly on getting 4-6 aircraft and 2-3 teams, and could only spend resources on actual gear (weapons and armor) when near the game’s ending. That’s because depending on RNG (mainly for HD’s) I either snowball to be rich or to be poor. When rich, it’s fast paced but ok. When poor, it’s a mad dash to prevent the end of the world, losing any far away havens, having a hard time equipping my guys and making alliances.
On cthulhu I snowballed to be rich and by the end of january I was 70+ with Syn, 50+ with NJ and 25+ with Anu. No money problems nor moving around the world, 2 8-team squads, 2 manticores and 2 syn ships. No steals, no raids, almost no trading and none for profit, only by resource necessity.
On necro I snowballed to be poor because I got almost no HD’s nor pandoran bases at the beginning and only by the end of february could I reach 50+ with all 3 factions. I only got 25+ with Syn and NJ in february. Half of the america’s havens are gone (I started in Africa). Now I’m finally OK on resources because I managed until now by almost not spending a material dime. Now I am spending everything on the 3rd team and finally upgrades, BUT… the faction wars are coming and I could sprint to the endgame if I wanted to. However I want to see a faction ending (haven’t seen one yet) but I’m about 70 SYN, 50 NJ and 40 Anu. Syn is my best bet and I have already the 75% mission + a citadel to destroy.
Personally I think this is a strategically bad descension if I’m not misinterpreting what you wrote (no offence).
4 aircraft means for me 4 independent teams and not only 2. I think the way you go is a waste of resources, time and for this also possibilities only to get these max 8 Squaddies per mission that are mostly not necessary especially in the early stages.
4 independent teams means roughly double coverage, more income by more defending and more exploring, the snowball rolls faster into the direction to be rich
You’re right, I was playing like I did in the old versions (those had sudden difficulty spikes, hard ambushes, and I like to play safe) and the new pandoran evolution and patches changed that very much. January is a cake walk in general. Which is not bad - it’s just, again, too fast, too much happens in January.
For that to change, something has to change in the exploration side too, since it’s limited. There’s a ticket on canny about land vehicle exploration. Those could be “expeditions” with a chance to generate random mission types (scavenge, rescue, pandoran raids, ambushes, etc) to help after the player finished exploring the world.
I like the idea, but I would prefer limitless exploration where you could fly anywhere you wanted (regardless of PoI’s) and you would find other factions (pandorans included) going about their agendas, and you would be able to interfere. Just like in the original x-com where you could find wandering alien craft anywhere, and take them out or wait for them to land and attack. You could also find them starting terror sites, for example. That was the most awesome feature of the geoscape for me.
Yes there has something to change with exploration, in my actual campaign I’m out of any POI’s, even the new ones were all explored. At mid February!
Now I have 7 aircraft’s fully manned and 5 of them are mostly useless sitting on bases or the new ancient sites and waiting for … nothing?
I can solve almost anything that happens actually with my 2 highly experienced main Squads in their Helios. Some of the more difficulty ones (like conquering new ancient sites) they go together but most of the missions they are able to do alone.
Now it feels for me that I have wasted many resources in the early stages to build up all these Squads and their only job right now is to activate the mining for the new resources.
I’m probably able to finish the game in another 2 weeks, somewhat around end February, early March. But I decided to do all the LotA stuff and delayed the main story. All factions on 100%, the doomclock is pretty fine with a bit over 70%, overall only 3 Heavens lost and actually no war between factions. I have activated 18 bases, all with scanners and mist repellers, the last one is close to the one that I get from Synedrion, so not necessary to get this one.
Game over because I was too fast in the early game? Feels slightly wrong for me …
Edit:
I did not one raid and also not abuse the trading, but I traded when it was necessary. The only abusing thing I did in the early stages were 5 sabotage missions to pump up the reputation for all 3 factions.
100% this. Lairs are filled with pandorans carrying paralysis and virus weapons, which causes evacs to last 10, 20 turns or even longer. VERY, VERY tedious, to the point I’m thinking about uninstalling the game.
Soldier is hit with virus, panicks; recovers, panics again, recover, panic… Only for some other pandoran to show up from nowhere, shoot him again, and start the loop over.
There are plenty of good suggestions on this thread, hopefully one of them will get implemented on a future update…
Make ghouls high priority targets and make sure to scout before advancing so that they don’t surprise you. The poachers are very susceptible to explosives, and the redeemer is not a durable weapon so is fairly easy to destroy.
