Talk:Item Weight (TFTD)

Maxing out on grenades

I have used the "jihad" tactic in the past in UFO where I had to go up a lift around which 7 or 8 aliens were clustered. Send one guy up and he is instantly killed. So one can have everyone else arm a grenade and throw it to a sacrificial mule. He picks them, then goes up the lift shaft with 10 or 12 armed grenades. He is instantly killed and his payload then goes off, taking all the aliens with him. It is a helpful way to dispose of soldiers with weak MC, though risky (i.e. relies on your getting control over the guy back for at least two full moves).

I'm trying to figure out the maximum number of grenades a "jihadi" could carry. The strength of a soldier is capped at 70, and a grenade has a weight of 3, so I take it this means in theory a soldier could carry 23 grenades. There are, IIRC, 25 slots (hands = 2, shoulders = 4, legs = 4, backpack = 9, belt = 6 [7?]). So he could store 23, but could he move? How does the routine work to convert weight into a movement penalty?

Also, is it possible to add so much weight that the guy uses all his TUs up just standing there? If so, this would mean he was effectively stranded because if he starts every turn with 0 TUs, he can't even drop anything.4th Cuirassier 06:31, 31 January 2011 (EST)

See: Time_Units#Encumbrance

the Encumbrance formula doesn't kick in until after weight goes over the strength level. The percentage of weight units over the soldier's strength level determines how much of a reduction to apply to your TU refresh rate each turn.

Let's say you are 7 weight units over a strength level of 70 for example. That's a 10% reduction in TUs on the next turn. So if this soldier has 64 max TUs, then only 57 points will be recovered on the next turn.

When you reach double your strength level, then 0% of your TUs are recovered each turn. -NKF 06:52, 31 January 2011 (EST)

This tactic could be very dangerous with psi-weak soldiers and enemy MC still active. I was not able to prove it in my AI tests, but it's likely the AI is capable of using armed grenades on a human when it assumes control - it's certainly very capable of using them on aliens in TFTD. Also consider that controlled humans seem to get crazy numbers of TUs, and a psi-weak squaddie loaded down with armed grenades could be highly dangerous. Still, if you've used this tactic successfully and repeatedly (and your Aquanauts were spotted by the enemy), then maybe that tells us the AI can't use armed human grenades after all. Question - were they regular grenades, or alien types eg. Sonic Pulsers? -Spike 15:29, 31 January 2011 (EST)

The most suitable sacrifice material is in fact soldiers who are panicked, rather than outright MC-controlled. Typically they fire their weapon randomly, then drop it and freeze, or just do the latter. Then they recover, but with morale very low. The AI then seems to move on and tries to find someone it can actually control (my observation, but may not be universal).

These guys are basically useless even once over their panic, and you've paid for them anyway, so I figure rather than take them home and sack them I'll send them out in a blaze of glory. It's impractical to have them arm every grenade themselves, so the best way is if everyone else arms one each, then tosses their grenade to the mule for him to pick up. It works quite well in alien bases, and in U:EU on bigger ships, where you are apt to groups of baddies in knots. In TFTD, it works best if you spot a group on the level below. You festoon a guy with grenades then walk him over a hole in the floor

I have a feeling that in U:EU, only one grenade need go off and it sets off all the others, but maybe I remembered that wrong. 4th Cuirassier 20:51, 31 January 2011 (EST)

That's Apocalypse - though even that seems to observe some strange rules whereby not all explosives go off. In UFO, one grenade will blow up any other armed grenades instantly, wasting them all. In TFTD they upped the armour level s so that grenades are practically immune to explosives so you can set multiple grenades and throw them to the same spot for extra carnage.

To be honest I'm not a big fan of sacrificial walking bombs - but I guess it's certainly one way to sucker punch the aliens in the event of a surprise attack. And if the unit somehow survives and doesn't go off - then there's a story to be told.

Regarding AI using grenades, from observations with UFO's inventory trick, they certainly can use any normal high-explosive type grenade, though am not sure about proximity mines or smoke. Also as evident by their mind controlled victims using your own weapons against you. I suspect they might have a slightly different deployment method than yours, at least if you go by the 'last gunshot sfx' sound they make when they throw them. -NKF 00:10, 1 February 2011 (EST)

I'm not a huge fan of walking bombs either, but someone who gets mind-controlled or panicked is a menace and has to be sacked. As he's a write-off anyway, I figure he can make himself useful one last time. Expending versus sacking is only 20 points' difference (something I've long wanted to hack; modern militaries are averse to casualties, so something like -300 points per soldier and -150 per civvy killed would IMHO be more challenging).

It has been quite useful in base attacks where someone gets MCed on the outside level. This tells me, possibly for the first time, that the guy is a liability. Once through to the lower level he is relatively safe, because lobstermen don't do a lot of MC - but he's only safe till the next mission, of course. So that's where the hole-in-the-floor trick comes in. Load him and expend him. If I'm feeling charitable I may stun him, tacke him home and sack him, but not always.

I think you are right about prox mines and smoke - I don't recall seeing these used by MCed soldiers. Another thing you rarely see any alien do, for some reason, is use the waypoing facility with their DPLs. They just fire them directly, quite often killing themselves in the process.