Difference between revisions of "Wish List (EU)"

Revision as of 21:02, 19 September 2008

X-Com is a great game and as evidence just look to the fact this wiki exists even though the game pre-dates the internet. In all it's greatness X-Com has some elements and behaviors players wish they could change. This is a repository of those desires. Some day a fan mod may make your wish come true...

I Wish...

State what you want AND what X-com does normally. Sign your name if you think "Oh man! That would be great!"

Fuel Ready always

I wish that I could send out craft at any fuel or ammo level. Normally craft can only leave a base if fully "ready". Craft is only "ready" at 100% fuel (or 0% fuel using an exploit) but there's no logical reason why a full tank and full ammo is required. Fully repaired... that's fine. I can live with pilots refusing to fly a plane missing a wing even if it means England is lost to aliens. 15 hours to fill a tank? Retarded but I can live with that too if I can send out a craft at 20% fuel. --Brunpal

Actually, many modern aircraft do require the fuel tanks to be full on takeoff, and fairly empty on landing. The weight of the fuel is figured into the takeoff aerodynamics, and the tank being full prevents fuel 'sloshing' in the tanks and not actually making it to the engine. (Conversely, many aircraft need to have dispensed of much of that fuel weight before landing.) This holds for most runway-takeoff craft, but may not apply to anything with VTOL capacity; I'm unsure there.

I do agree that non-full weapons aren't as critical, though. But from a logical standpoint, most modern aircraft should not be launched on an empty fuel tank. I also should noted that an Elerium-fueled craft with 50% fuel or less remaining will automatically return to base, regardless of distance from base. Of course, given that such craft fuel up quickly, its less of an issue there. Arrow Quivershaft 22:05, 7 August 2008 (PDT)

Hum, maybe you can try this? Seb76 13:01, 8 August 2008 (PDT)

Thanks! But I can't try it. I've not been able to get my copy of Xcom to run properly except on a Win98 install. VC2008 requires a more modern OS. I'm sure I could eventually figure out a way to get it running, but I tried once and wasted too much time before giving up.--Brunpal 14:45, 8 August 2008 (PDT)

AFAIK VC2008 binaries should run OK on Win98 as long as the runtime is deployed. Anyway, the loader uses CreateRemoteThread API which is not available in Win98 so don't even bother. However, you can manually patch the binary if you want ;-) Data to patch (all in hexadecimal):

offset 0x41752: 2A0075 -> 18207C

HTH. Seb76 14:56, 8 August 2008 (PDT)

Smarter on Globe

I wish all craft understood the shortest distance between two points on a globe is a curved path towards the poles. Normally a craft goes in the opposite direction than it should (towards the equator). Pain in the ass when the base in the UK sends a craft to Siberia. --Brunpal

Equipment Management

Soldiers remembers THEIR equipment

I wish soldiers remembered what equipment they LAST used and start with that gear when they land. Normally soldiers grab various gear and put lots of crap on their belt. I put most things on the shoulder slots, and keep many things spare things on the ship just in case I need them. (I only want IN rounds if it's night. Stop picking them up before I shoot you in the back!) Takes forever to sort out the gear so the weakling isn't carrying all the rockets etc. --Brunpal

This is already available in XcomUtil. Arrow Quivershaft 22:07, 7 August 2008 (PDT)

Access to Stats screens during equipment allocation

In Battlescape you can get to Stats screens by right clicking on one of the unit's status bars. However you can't do this in the Equipment screen. Things like Statstrings and (even more so) Seb76's modified Equipment screen with actual/max weight help. But it would be nice to be able to see exact stats. Spike 12:06, 3 September 2008 (PDT)

Fog of War Mk. 2

I'm sure most of these would be an absolute PAIN to implement, but I figured I'd toss the ideas out here.

Blind Dropship Pilots

One thing that has always irked me is X-COM has no terrain knowledge when it lands, despite having probably circled the place two or three times before landing and thus they should know at least some of the area. This would be nice, but isn't too important. Probably would be a pain to implement so X-COM would have all knowledge of external features but no knowledge of building interiors, anyways. Arrow Quivershaft 22:38, 7 August 2008 (PDT)

Yes at the very least, when you splash the UFO, it could tell you (via some miracle technology such as "satellite reconnaisance") what the terrain type is of the landing zone area. Then you could adjust equipment accordingly. And adjust your uniform camouflage (if using one of the uniform mods). Spike 12:16, 3 September 2008 (PDT)

Geoscape: center on the site, then maximum zoom. Aside from having to disambiguate forest from jungle, this works fine for knowing the exact terrain you're getting into. -- Zaimoni 10:17, 4 Sept 2008 (CDT)

This is already present in the game. To center the Geoscape on a specific location, right-click on the target spot. To do maximum zoom in, right click on the Zoom-In button(and the same works for Zoom-Out). Also, Jungle and Forest use the same display algorithm, but are easy to differentiate; Forest occurs NORTH of the equator, and Jungle occurs SOUTH. Arrow Quivershaft 13:23, 4 September 2008 (PDT)

Moving Fog

The Fog of War in X-COM is clumsily implemented, compared to modern expectations. Everything starts out black, but after exploring, is shown...and it's kept in the same showing, regardless of whether you actually have LoS to that area anymore. It would be nice if when you no longer had Line of Sight to a particular map area, it would be cloaked in a way so that you knew the terrain, but not the units there. Since I've sometimes spent over half an hour trying to hunt down that last alien hiding in area I'd already explored. Arrow Quivershaft 22:38, 7 August 2008 (PDT)

Deactivate Object Radar

Currently, in X-COM, any objects dropped in a given square show on your Battlescape, regardless of whether you have Line of Sight to the square or not. In regards to dropped weapons/grenades/equipment/dead soldiers/dead aliens, this doesn't make a large difference. But in the case of STUNNED aliens, a quick scan across the Battlescape can tell you whether the alien you stunned 10 turns ago is still down, or stood back up(the stunned alien object will disappear from the stack). Of course, since aliens which have revived from stun are almost always disarmed(and the ones that aren't probably should've been killed instead), the usefulness of this 'exploit' is reduced mainly to finding out that the last alien you're looking for is just wandering aimlessly and unarmed. Perhaps leave stacks showing the same until you regain LoS to that area? Arrow Quivershaft 22:38, 7 August 2008 (PDT)

Score for retaliation Battleships

When a Battleship on retaliation attacks your base and is shot down, you get no score for it. This is completely illogical and it discourages any use of base defences. You should get normal 700 (or even 1400) points for it. --Kyrub 14:05, 30 August 2008 (PDT)

I'm not sure about this. Yes it's illogical, but it could also be a licence to get a huge score if you have a strong enough base. Spike 12:16, 3 September 2008 (PDT)

The impenetrable base setup would turn into a cheat. As the aliens will keep hammering the base with a battleship until one breaks through, you'll have a steady supply of points without having to really do anything. Some balancing, such as paying to rearm your defence modules, ought to be thrown in to balance things out. -NKF 23:13, 13 September 2008 (PDT)

A better fix would be to remove the retaliation flag when a battleship is destroyed. If someone can post a savegame with a never-ending flow of base attacks, I may have a look at the fix. Seb76 01:05, 15 September 2008 (PDT)

Decrease Accuracy for targets out of sight

How come you can easily shoot on something you do not see? I find the over-used scout-sniper tactic is a cheap exploit of the X-COM. The tactical game should describe a combat, not a cowardly shooting practice. It would turn into a nice feature, if there would be a penalty of (let us say) -20% to the accuracy of anybody who is firing on a target out of his current sight. This can greatly enhance the tactical depth of the game. (Seb around? ;-) --Kyrub 14:20, 30 August 2008 (PDT)

There is a penalty. Bullet drift. The further away you are, the more this will impact the bullet, potentially making even a 100% accurate shot miss. Also X-Com maps are pretty small, and the aliens already cheat enough as it is to make things difficult even with the sniper/scout strategy. In Apocalypse they addressed this with adding weapon ranges. But then, even some weapons were capable of shooting beyond the unit's ability to see an enemy target. - NKF 23:07, 13 September 2008 (PDT)

That's not really a good reason for me. 1) Bullet drift has a very small effect in the game, because the actual percents are set quite high. Example: if you spray an unseen alien from the other corner of the map with autofire of 35%, you'll get a 73,6% chance to hit with at least one bullet. Physics and game balance, adieu. 2) Moreover, bullet drift has nothing to do with not seeing the target. It should be the contrary, you ACCIDENTALLY hit something you don't see, no? 3) You get a penalty for handling two weapons in the same time. Why couldn't we take the same penalty (80%*Acc) for the hit-out-of-sight? (Well, I can't do this actually, maybe others can)--Kyrub 18:25, 14 September 2008 (PDT)

I don't agree that bullet drift is already there as a penalty, since this doesn't distinguish between seen and unseen targets at all (ok it does indirectly, only in so far as unseen targets tend to be further away). I think we should look at 3 cases: 1. person firing did not happen to be the one who spotted the target. 2. person firing could not see/spot the target under any circumstances. In the first case, we can assume the firer has visual contact with the target, after someone else pointed it out. No accuracy penalty should be applied (maybe a TU penalty?). In the second case, there should be an accuracy penalty. 80% would be generous, I would go for 50%. Or maybe something non-linear, so that autofire percentages would not fall by as much as aimed fire and snap fire percentages. One problem you have is how to present these two different cases to the player before they take the shot. It's a bit obscure if you just show them a lower hit probability without explaining why. Spike 19:02, 14 September 2008 (PDT)

Bullet drift is an effect on range (actually it has quite a major effect on the blaster bomb), but yes it's not because of whether or not the unit can see the alien. But then again, the maps are small. If you ever took lots of screen shots of the map and made a large composite from them, you'd find that the area of operations is very tiny and that the 20 tile visual range means that our avatars are quite short sighted. That's not realistic either, but imposed for game balance. Other tactical games appear to handle the accuracy vs. range dropoff issue by combining the shooter's skill and the weapon's maximum range. Basically you can operate the weapon to the best of the shooter's ability within the maximum range, but the further away you try to aim, accuracy is decreased. In some games, you even get to see the effect on the accuracy before you pull the trigger as the accuracy is attached to the cursor. - NKF 22:46, 14 September 2008 (PDT)

Actually the blaster bomb "drift" issue is not mainly caused by drift, but by accuracy adjustment between each waypoint (60% for xcom players, 55% for aliens). Maybe we can cook a kind of "max effective range" for a weapon base on firing mode (auto<snap<aimed) and gun type (pistol/rifle). Firing above this range would decrease the accuracy. Seb76 01:03, 15 September 2008 (PDT)

(to NKF) The main flaw of the whole "shoot the unseen" thing is the aliens cannot shoot back at somebody shooting at them (no reaction fire). If they could (or if they'd shoot at least the soldier they see), I wouldn't complain. This destroys the battle tactics side of the game, you just sent a man to "spot them". Nota bene, they cannot use the same scout-sniper tactic, the way we do, either. (This would be most annoying, by the way).

(to Seb76) Effective range would restore some balance and add some use to the aimed shots. I thought about a simpler solution with substracting some accuracy (which would make auto useless, snap into a poor and aimed into a solid chance-to-hit). Your suggestion is much more elegant, Seb, if you can cook it ;-) --Kyrub 08:00, 18 September 2008 (PDT)

Fair enough, but do note that even your units cannot react against an alien that they cannot see within their visual range. Attacks of opportunity and actively taking your turn are two different tasks after all. I'm not sure the aliens would be such sportsmen though. It might be worth looking into whether there is cooperation amongst the aliens while they are taking their turn - and I think I just have the scenario savegame to test this. If I could find it. BBs probably break the rules of basic firearms and range, and mind control has its own set of rules, so probably wouldn't count. -NKF 00:37, 19 September 2008 (PDT)

Enough Smoke

It would be nice to increase the current limit on smoke/fire hexes. This is due to their locations being stored in a small, fixed length array. In effect you can only get about 3-4 smoke grenades worth of smoke or fire on the map at the same time. Being able to use smoke liberally would really open up new tactics. At the moment all you can really do is cover the LZ in smoke when you exit the transport, and maybe cover one advance over open ground. Spike 12:06, 3 September 2008 (PDT)

I did something for that on my loader. Heavy testing is required because it is hard to be make sure smoke still works as before (testing is the hardest part actually). Seb76 14:09, 18 September 2008 (PDT)

Restore Game from Battlescape

It would be nice to be able to reload a saved game directly from the Battlescape "?" screen, rather than having to go through the process of Abandoning to the Geoscape. Would you need to check it was a Battlescape save and not a Geoscape save? Maybe, maybe not. Spike 12:06, 3 September 2008 (PDT)

Warm Grenades

Currently when you set the timer on a grenade (or HE pack), the timer runs down every turn regardless of whether the grenade is worn, held, or dropped. Then, when the timer runs out, it explodes unless it is held or worn. There is no real grenade or explosive that works this way. Once the timer (fuse) starts running, they explode regardless. However for most hand grenades, the timer (fuse) doesn't start until after you throw/drop the grenade. It would be nice to have both of these real world behaviours, and lose the game's default behaviour. Spike 12:06, 3 September 2008 (PDT)

Technically the way the game implements grenades, they don't have a timer. At least, not as such. When you set a grenade, the game just assigns it a turn to blow up on. Once the turn has passed, the game checks to see that it's on the ground and blows it up if it is, otherwise it doesn't. I believe Seb76 has already addressed this in his patches where there's an option to make grenade blow up regardless whether they are in inventory or otherwise the moment the timer is set. X-Com Apocalypse does a good job of this. The moment the grenade is so much as moved after the timer is set, it counts down. - NKF 23:01, 13 September 2008 (PDT)

To simulate an actual timer, you would need to do something like: Every turn that a primed grenade is being held by a unit during the "explode" check, increment by +1 the turn when that grenade is going to explode. Spike 19:10, 14 September 2008 (PDT)

I think I would change quantity2 (OBPOS.DAT) to a countdown instead of a turn, and use quantity3 as a flag indicating if the count has started. This flag is set any time a turn ends and the grenade has no owner. Taking it back in your hand once the timer has started won't help and the thing must be thrown... quantity2 is decreased if quantity3 is set, and the grenade blows up as usual. Seb76 01:35, 15 September 2008 (PDT)

Stun Grenades

I want flashbangs.--Brunpal 22:59, 11 September 2008 (PDT)

Instead of stunning, I'd see more effect if it would remove some TUs to units having line of sight (to be fare it should affect xcom units too). It would help against reaction fire (which is the point of flashbangs). Given that grenades detonate at the end turns, it would require a good coordination to have the grenade detonate exactly at the end of the alien turn, and just before your attack. Being able to open doors à la xcom2 would also help to throw flashbangs just before a craft assault... Seb76 22:03, 12 September 2008 (PDT)

That would be good. Hard to program, potentially extremely unbalancing, but good. I considered a "debuff" kind of ability (as you suggest) for flashbangs, vs the more obvious substitution of stun for HE damage. In the end, I picked "I want flashbangs."--Brunpal 03:32, 13 September 2008 (PDT)

Maybe flashbangs dont' work on Aliens - otherwise, XCom would use them, right? :) But seriously, I too would like flashbangs, and stun grenades / concussion grenades. Both of these would make the game easier, though. With flashbangs, you might have to compensate by just giving the aliens more TUs. Spike 13:33, 13 September 2008 (PDT)

More options for the player is going to make it easier for any kind of game. Particularly of games like XCOM where the computer can't take advantage of the changes. However I don't believe a weak stun grenade (like 44 stun damage, comparable to AC-HE) would change the game much because the 80 item limit remains.--Brunpal 22:21, 13 September 2008 (PDT)

Night Vision

I don't want to add night vision equipment to the game. I assume that either (1) all XCom units already have night vision gear as standard, but it's not as good as alien night vision, and the visibility that XCom units have at night is based on their standard-issue night vision gear, or (2) night vision gear does not work on Aliens. Either they do not appear on night vision, or maybe worse - maybe the aliens can manipulate night vision equipment, causing worse than normal vision, or hallucinations, and even tricking XCom units into firing on each other. Spike 13:33, 13 September 2008 (PDT)

Throwing over stuff

I want to throw stuff over other stuff. I don't find grenades useful. I much rather shoot a rocket launcher from outside reaction shot range because even when you miss, odds are it's close enough. The throw itself has an arc trajectory and can hit the ceiling (a feature I like) but to pick the target it has to have straight line of sight (like a bullet) which is stupid. I want to throw onto the top of buildings where I can't see, or bounce a grenade off the ceiling and over the head of a squadie because I don't have line of sight with a gun. If I had line of sight, I would just shoot since that costs less TU even if I already had an armed grenade.

The easiest way to accomplish this is to keep "out of range" but remove "you can't throw there" and just let a solider throw to any square they want. A better way is to keep the warning but give the player the option to try the throw anyway. If you can't really throw there, then oops... that's your badly positioned live grenade to deal with.--Brunpal 22:59, 11 September 2008 (PDT)

I did some tests disabling the "you can't throw there" check and it does not work. The grenade ends up in the vicinity of the throwing unit. Actually the line of sight is not used when throwing objects. I'm 98% sure it simulates the throwing of the object and if it intercepts anything, the throw is refused. Seb76 04:47, 13 September 2008 (PDT)

The explicit emulation of the trajectory has been verified as part of the throwing range testing by Zombie and myself. The range bands are not consistent with a continuous model; they look like a table lookup from the same source 3rd ed. GURPS (Steve Jackson Games) uses. -- Zaimoni 8:21 13 September 2008 (CDT)

Units don't need LOS to an area to throw a grenade, as evidenced by my favored tactic of chucking an Alien Grenade or HE Pack into any Medium or Large Scout which has had the roof blown away in the crash from outside to 'pacify' any remaining crew. Arrow Quivershaft 09:22, 13 September 2008 (PDT)

Really? It never seems to work for me. Always requires me to have line of sight. For example tossing in a grenade into the roof hole doesn't work for me if the solider is on level 0 and I target a square inside at level 0. The walls and door obviously block the LoS. However I can target an area on level 1 or 2 in mid air and throw to that location where it naturally drops down to level 0. However I have line of sight to those higher levels in that case. That's an acceptable compromise in many cases but in others it fails completely. For example having an alien on the top of a 2 story building (level 2) in the middle and a solider standing next to the building and not being able to toss a grenade onto the center of the roof. I could toss a ball there in real life. I wouldn't have thought the trajectory would have been high/steep enough to hit the "sky roof".--Brunpal 22:04, 13 September 2008 (PDT)

Just how strong are your soldiers? The stronger they are, the higher their toss. There are various occasions where you don't need to see where you're throwing to throw. For example, try tossing grenades over a tall fence or hedge. A High Explosive pack into the apple orchard that is surrounded by a hedge on farm maps is often an easy way to smoke out any hidden aliens - and the orchard. One likely cause why you can't throw inside the UFO is that there's something in the way inside that's preventing the throw, such as a wall. Try adjusting your throwing destination, or reposition your soldier for a better throwing angle.

I've often found grenades to be much more reliable than a directional attack early in the game where firing accuracy is much lower. You ought to try playing a few of the simpler missions like supply ship or large scout assaults with an all-grenadier cast. Takes a bit of planning to not destroy much of the loot, but otherwise literally a blast. -NKF 22:52, 13 September 2008 (PDT)

Enforced Variant Games

Various people like to play various variant games, such as No Alien Technology, or No Detection, or No Lethal Weapons - see for example Scott Jones' notes to XComUtil. It would be nice to have options on the game executable to enforce these scenarios. Self restraint is hard! Spike 12:06, 3 September 2008 (PDT)

Assault Time Limit

One of the cool things about UFO Defence is there are no time limits on the scenarios. This is great as it allows for a totally different kind of tactics and much more flexibility. It's more of a "thinking man's game" as a result. But... arguably this is not very realistic for UFO Assault missions. If the Aliens are getting creamed, they should try to make a getaway if they can (just like XCom would). A simple way to implement this would be a hard time limit (say 20 turns?) on a UFO Assault. Another way would be to base it on Alien Morale. At a certain Morale level the aliens decide to dust off. Give the player say 3 turns warning while they rev up the engines. Then if there is still a Navigator or Engineer in the Control Room alive, the ship takes off. Any XCom troops still aboard are MIA.

You might run into problems if the UFO took off but then landed again or was shot down, generating another ground mission with potentially more Aliens than were still alive at the end of the Assault. (Still, maybe they hatch some more clones if they get time to....) Spike 09:51, 4 September 2008 (PDT)

It strikes me as justified they don't do that. Troops loose in the vessel could be seriously bad. It would be nice if they dusted off on the condition that their morale was low enough or 3 X-com soldiers had the door in their sights without aliens alive outside in the latter case and no X-com soldiers on board in either case. also, if the UFO has a hole in either the command or engine room, it would have to set down before leaving the atmosphere. (name here)

Base Build Stacking

At the moment you are only allowed to build next to a finished module, and you aren't allowed to plan ahead in your base construction. It would be nice to at least be able to plan more than one phase of construction in advance. This would be pretty easy to implement. There is no need to code any new "queuing system". Just place the new module next to an existing under-construction module, but increment the build time to the normal build time + the time remaining on the under-construction module (the lowest time remaining that would make the square you are building in, a legal square to build in). As a premium for build stacking, you have to pay the costs up-front. As with normal construction, all costs are non-refundable if you change your mind. (There would probably need to be some on-screen feedback for how long the module would take to build, before you were committed to building it.) Spike 12:06, 3 September 2008 (PDT)

Recuit Certain Enemy

Consider that not all alien loyal to its master (most TFTD alien has a device lodged to its brain), it should be interesting (or at least cool) if we can recuit such alien. Maybe we can replace those controling device from captive alien after research that specie. Or convince head of the Snakemen that it would be far more benefit to help us instead of the Ethereal L-Zwei 23:25, 12 September 2008 (PDT).

Only certain alien types should be recruitable. Ones that should NOT be include Mutons (as they are directly controlled by Ethereals), Chrysallids (unbalancing), etc. It would be nice to be able to reverse-engineer Cyberdiscs or Sectopods, or make it that a Cyberdisc must be researched to build hovertanks/etc. MagicJuggler 13:32, 18 September 2008 (PDT)

Alien AI

Attempts to rearm

Aliens cannot pick up items, but I wish they would. If an alien has no useful weapons in inventory they should either head for cover or head for a plasma weapon. Panicked aliens drop their weapons but never seem to pick them up when they managed to pull themselves together. It would be nice if they tried to arm themselves again. --Brunpal 13:55, 19 September 2008 (PDT)

Aliens better with explosions

I wish that aliens using grenades or blaster bombs or stun bombs (anything that goes boom) would use more sense. They should not want to use items that go boom when they are guaranteed to be caught in the blast radius. The alien can use grenades and blaster bombs by going out of line of sight before the explosion goes off. That may not save them if the explosion blows out the walls. At least it would be less stupid then firing a point blank blaster bomb vs taking 5 steps and setting up another waypoint. Units with morale above 100 or mind controlled should still be suicidal as normal.--Brunpal 13:55, 19 September 2008 (PDT)

Fix All Bugs

Oh no Seb76 already did this! :) Spike 12:06, 3 September 2008 (PDT)

@@ Line 163: / Line 163: @@
 Aliens cannot pick up items, but I wish they would. If an alien has no useful weapons in inventory they should either head for cover or head for a plasma weapon. Panicked aliens drop their weapons but never seem to pick them up when they managed to pull themselves together. It would be nice if they tried to arm themselves again. --[[User:Brunpal|Brunpal]] 13:55, 19 September 2008 (PDT)
-====Aliens smarter with explosions====
+====Aliens better with explosions====
-I wish that aliens using grenades or blaster bombs or stun bombs (anything that goes boom) would use more sense. If they should not want to use items that go boom when they are guaranteed to be caught in the blast radius. The alien can use grenades and blaster bombs by going out of line of sight before the explosion goes off. That may not save them if the explosion blows out the walls. At least it would be less stupid then firing a point blank blaster bomb vs taking 5 steps and setting up another waypoint. --[[User:Brunpal|Brunpal]] 13:55, 19 September 2008 (PDT)
+I wish that aliens using grenades or blaster bombs or stun bombs (anything that goes boom) would use more sense. They should not want to use items that go boom when they are guaranteed to be caught in the blast radius. The alien can use grenades and blaster bombs by going out of line of sight before the explosion goes off. That may not save them if the explosion blows out the walls. At least it would be less stupid then firing a point blank blaster bomb vs taking 5 steps and setting up another waypoint. Units with morale above 100 or mind controlled should still be suicidal as normal.--[[User:Brunpal|Brunpal]] 13:55, 19 September 2008 (PDT)
 ==Fix All Bugs==