Let's Play UFO - Aftershock : Victory!

[Azira]

Table of Contents
1: Introduction
2: Getting started
3: Cyborgs and railroad tracks
4: Psionics, research and production
5: The roster
6: Current equipment available
7: A closer look at some of the combat mechanics
8: R.I.P. eklektyk, a Titan among men
9: Cultists!
10: Exotic weaponry
11: Reticulans, heavy armour and drones
12: Attacked by a space walnut!
13: Friendly fire
14: New cyborg and psi equipment
15: Assault on the cultist temple part 1
16: Temple assault part 2
17: Starghosts and warp weaponry
18: Cracking a nut
19: Intrepid native
20: Victory!

 Current roster:
Humans
 dextermorg, Gunman/Technician/Leader
 korenzel, Medic/Sniper/Scout
 Gondolin, Gunman/Trooper/Technician
 JoKa, Stalker/Commando/Scout
 Anus, Sniper/Stalker/Scout
 K. Slips, Scout/Stalker/Medic
 chzr, Medic/Trooper/Sniper
 EdwardRM, Ranger/Commando/Stalker
 Sergiu64, Scout/Stalker/Ranger
 Commissar, Leader/Commando/Stalker

Cyborgs
 Storyfag, Cyborg/Commando/Stalker
 Desmodus, Cyborg/Ranger/Scout
 Claus, Cyborg/Technician/Medic
 Cassidy, Cyborg/Sniper/Commando

Psionics
 Bee, Psionic/Sniper/Scout
 Phoenix, Psionic/Leader/Ranger

Waiting in line

Honoured dead
 eklektyk, Leader

Alright! Last time we saved the earth, slew the reticulan breeders that were seeding our fair planet with biomass with the purpose of killing off every living thing on our planet to feed and create a god-like intelligence. We returned as heroes, the alien's nefarious plan foiled.
And I promised that I'd continue with the next game in the series, if I still had the motivation for it. As luck would have it, currently I do.
But all is not well. It seems the producers of this, the second game in the series, decided to fuck us all over. They decided that we did not travel to the moon and destroy the reticulan base, that we instead took the offer of the reticulans to have the select best of humanity carted off into space, and then let the earth be consumed by biomass.
As could be expected, the reticulan could not entirely live up to their offer. The did cart off some humans into space, and a group of these humans is what we take control of in this game, UFO Aftershock. Watch the intro video here.
So. Our valiant group of heroes are refugees from an orbital spacestation who got into a fight with other inhabitants of said spacestation, blew everything up, and escaped into space. Only to land on another spacestation..
Oh well. We'd better roll with it if we want to play this game. Onwards to the game!



We create a new game under the proud name of Codex. I set the difficulty to normal, because, to be frank, I can't be arsed to slog my way through endless hordes of enemies just to say "see everybody! I finished the game on Super Hero difficulty! Now, come all and admire the impressive length and girth of my might e-penis". I'm a grown man, I have a wife and child, I'm happy with my chosen line of work and I'm doing this LP to show you the game, not my l337 skillz.

We click OK, and are greeted by poorly animated characters flapping their lips at us while the text below them are read to us by surprisingly well-articulated english speakers.





That's a small guide to how the game works. It's quite simple and find it intuitive enough.
The next screen that greets us is one we'll become extremely familiar with as the game progresses. The geospace screen.



The buttons are nicely labeled and should be self-explanatory. Above the globe we see a box containing 3 symbols each followed by two numbers. It's our resources, showing our stockpile and current balance. The first is low-tech supplies, next high-tech supplies and finally alien supplies. Supposedly. To me they're just numbers best kept positive, or our research and manufacturing abilities go to ground.
Floating a bit above the globe we see a circula thingie, surrounded by a larger circle. This represents our spacestation, and the area we can acces with our drop-pod currently. The spacestation is called the "Laputa" for reasons that elude me, and it can be moved around the planet to acces territory further away.
The circular dot on the planet from which a red column rises is a mission. The red colour denotes that it's a help/rescue mission, where we can come to the assistance of some of the indigenous people.
Yep. Contrary to what the last game led us to believe, the biomass did not kill off all earth-bound life it seems. There are still humans living on the planet. And some that are not quite human any more, but more on that later.
If we click on the mission, this screen pops up:



I choose "back" for now, as I have yet to assign callsigns to our recruits.
We have 4 humans waiting to go on a mission. 3 male, 1 female. Clicking the squad screen lets us access their inventory and training.







Our stocks of supplies is horrendously low at the moment, but that will change after our first mission, as we will then gain the ability to research new and existing tech, and the ability to manufacture new goods.
The only type of unit currently available to us is ordinary humans.



Soon though, we will encounter Cyborgs and Psionics on the surface. Cyborgs are all male only, and the Psionics female only. They have training options exclusive to them.




Their training allows them to equip either better bionic implants (Cyborgs) or psionic weaponry/equipment (Psionics, duh).
In this game, you can only choose 3 specialties to train, and Cyborgs and Psionics both have their first chosen for them, as they spawn with level 1 in their respective training modes at level 1.
The other training routes available are these:












Some trainings complement eachother well, some less so. All training is dependent on your stats to reach a certain level before it becomes available. I find that some of these trainings are less useful than others, while some are indispensible.
Our team will not function properly without at least one medic. We would also require at least one scout. Sniper training is very useful, especially for more physically frail characters such as Psionics. Whereas a melee powerhouse can be created from a Cyborg training as both a commando and stalker.
If we want to deploy robots later (remote controlled, they cannot level up) we also need at least one technician.
Being able to wear heavy armour and use heavy equipment is very nice, but not really that good an idea for, say, a sniper. But having a gunman/technician/leader is a really powerful combination.

This is where I let you people volounteer. Specify what race (human/cyborg/psionic) you want to be, specify gender preference if human, then specify what training routes you wish to pursue, and I'll let you get a spot in the team. If you do not specify these things when signing up, I will ruthlessly assign them as I see fit.
As soon as we have the first 4 human volounteers, I'll get the first mission done and start grabbing territory in the hopes of establishing contact with the psionics and cyborgs ASAP.
Godspeed.

 

[dextermorgan]

Sign me up for Gunman/Technician role pls.

 

[Crooked Bee]

Bee is a Psionic. But of course. Line of training: whatever best suits a Psionic.

I'm a grown man, I have a wife and child, I'm happy with my chosen line of work and I'm doing this LP to show you the game, not my l337 skillz.

 

[korenzel]

Re: Let's Play UFO - Aftershock : Introduction

We create a new game under the proud name of Codex. I set the difficulty to normal, because, to be frank, I can't be arsed to slog my way through endless hordes of enemies just to say "see everybody! I finished the game on Super Hero difficulty! Now, come all and admire the impressive length and girth of my might e-penis". I'm a grown man, I have a wife and child, I'm happy with my chosen line of work and I'm doing this LP to show you the game, not my l337 skillz.

In the interest of this LP, you should play on Super Hero or any difficulty in which you don't completely obliterate the game. Not to show your skills, that was already done in the near casulaty-less Aftermath LP. Following tactical games without a sufficient amount of death is rather boring, everything goes smoothly, you never suffer any setback, there isn't any risk.

In your Aftermath LP, most of the screens showed research, while the core of the game, the tactical missions, barely got a glance. I'd like to see more of it, and if you need a higher difficulty to make it challenging and worth a mention, I can't encourage you enough to do so.

It may take you longer to complete the game, but it will make for a more interesting read, and may render reviews of tactical missions worthwhile.

Whatever you decide, sign me up a human medic/sniper.

 

[Azira]

@korenzel

Higher difficulty in this game does not mean better AI. The verdict at the official forum is that the game isn't that difficult tactically, even on Super Human difficulty, and I fear I'll only wind up finding it frustrating having to mow through more enemies using more ammo.
I do intend to do more screens of the tactical gameplay this time around. But I will not do writeups of every mission, far from it. The first time I encounter a new mission, I'll capture some screens. I'll do shots when I encounter new enemies, and I'll endeavour to also show new equipment on the field, but truth be told, I find the tactical part of these games to be the most boring.
If people so desire though, I might restart the game at the highest difficulty setting. I will leave that up to the initial 5 volounteers, your vote counting as one for.

 

[korenzel]

Well, if we get a vote of the actual difficulty, I'd rather see you play Ironman at the highest difficulty you think you can handle, even if it means playing on normal or easy. It really changes the dynamics of a game, and is usually well suited to X-Com lookalikes as losing a mission doesn't mean you lose the game, contrary to most RPGs.

 

[Gondolin]

Sign me up, too. Hope I won't be the first to die again.

 

[JoKa]

i'd like to be our front-line man again... katana-wielding, this time.
stalker, commando and ranger(*edit, mixed it up with scout, d'uh) training of course ;-)
male human preferred, but as this is the codex, a tranny would be acceptable as well...

 

[Azira]

Alright. We can get going. Only one vote, meaning I go forth at the current difficulty, but Ironman. Lost missions are lost, dead characters are dead. I will be using the autosave feature, as there are still bugs in this game, but I will do my best to abide by the Ironman code.
Update later.

 

[JoKa]

please take note of my edit of my former post, mixed up ranger and scout (and we already have one scout, thankfully).
i think i never finished this game due to bugs and memory leaks (loading a mission took more and more time, 5min at the end...was fixable to a degree with restarting), so i hope you fare better than me (probable) and i see to live the end (doubtful).

 

[anus_pounder]

Anus, Sniper/Stalker/Scout

:salute

 

[Storyfag]

Sign me up as soon as you have a Cyborg slot open

 

[Desmodus Rotundus]

Sign me up as cyborg/ranger/stalker, start off with dual smg's later perhaps add katana, damn can't remember much of what made a good close range combatant.

edit: scratch that, I think commando was good if you wanted to melee, especially for that speed boost, so I'll go with cyborg/ranger/scout, just sneaks up and well dual smg's were a lot of fun for me, with cyro stabilizers, or silencers if these were in game, can't remember

 

[Azira]

@JoKa
The change is duly noted and will be implemented. Your stats are far from good enough yet, though, to qualify for the trainings.

@anus_pounder
Your build is noted. The top-tier abilities of the Stalker training are rather worthless with sniper weaponry though. The Enemy Anatomy skill only works with commando equipment, and that includes the following: Katana, throwing blades, shuriken.

@Storyfag
Your career will be glorious, no doubt.

@Desmodus Rotundus
You will be signed on as Desmodus. Dual smgs are indeed fun. Too bad you cannot dual-wield katanas. And do you mean close range combat, or melee. For melee I would substitute ranger training with commando, but for close range firefighting, ranger sounds about right.

 

[Desmodus Rotundus]

Yeah I remember now that close ranged and melee builds were different, edited my previous post with further details. I put scout in there but I still can't remember if he was any good, if you want to add some other class instead of it, be my quest.

 

[eklektyk]

Call To Arms

This LP lacks Commisar. Eklektyk voluntiers once more to fight good fight, kill xeno scum and all traitors heretics and cowards !!!

[obv Human pref Male and Leader rest U can throw wat U like/need]

 

[Azira]

Getting started

Alright, we have our first four human volounteers, so lets get the show on the road.






These are the four grunts we have to start building our planet-spanning, mutant-fighting empire. Let's hope they don't screw up too badly.



Most missions start off with such an image, where you can choose where your drop pod starts, and what direction the opening faces. I usually choose a corner spot, to lessen the risk of critters behind us.




The first mission starts off with a scripted event of a human telling us that they will be willing to ally with us, if we help them out.
Once he stops talking, the mission starts properly.



Here the squad is, sitting in the drop pod, waiting to flush out and start killing mutants.
Speaking of mutants.



This is the first one we spot. We know him from Aftermath, and the primary threat of this critter is his huge amount of hitpoints, and his ability to use weapons. With concentrated fire he quickly drops though, he was only wielding a handgun, didn't pose a real threat.




In these shots we see two other kinds of mutants. The Brainmen are rather harmless, as their attacks are very shortranged, they move slowly, and you often spot them a good distance away.
The Flatster is more annoying, as it's quite quick, is difficult to spot and can also attack from a distance. The Flatster is rather vulnerable to energy weapons though, and concentrated fire stops it before it reaches Gondolin:



There are quite a few Brainmen on this first level, but they are quickly felled due to their slow speed.



You can also see Gondolin targeting the unconscious Morelman on that pic. Sometimes unconscious opponents recover and can make your life miserable, so it's a good idea to finish opponents off in this game, unlike in Aftermath where they had the decency to stay down.





The mission ends as soon as we down the last Brainman, and the human survivor thanks us and surrenders control of two territories.




There are two kinds of territory in Aftershock. Bases and mines. Mines can yield one of the three desired resources, and the amount is set. You can increase this amount by a small degree, which we will touch upon in a later update. In the bases, you construct different kinds of buildings, to either help your research, your manufacturing, or defend the territory from enemy attack.



This is the research screen. Currently it's rather spartan, but that will change once we advance up the tech tree. We pick Basic Weapons Lab Floor Plan first, so we can get some better weapons made ASAP.




This is the diplomacy screen, in which you can ask for people or resources, or gift some resources. I've included the Ask for people screen, in which we can see that two recruits are currently available for hire.
The ask for resources is currently greyed out. You can only use this option if your relationship is better than neutral, and once you do, the relations reset to neutral. Doing help missions and gifting resources improve relations, taking territory by force or failing/declining a help mission reduces it.



Our PR guy seems pleased.



This is our manufacture screen. Currently, we can only produce armour, and we immediately order 5 sets. 5 sets, as we only have room for 5 troops in the pod currently.




We have succesfully researched one topic and start up another. In the first picture we can see what projects we cannot currently research, due to a lack of laboratories. All laboratories, save the "Laputa Lab" are built in earth-bound bases. So if we want to get proper research going, we need more Lebensraum.



Our first base is in Stuttgart. This is a high-quality base area, as there are 5 plots to place one of the 4 types of structure in. The different types of structure are factories, labs, defensive and knowledge structures. The more high-tech structure, the better knowledge level you need to have at the base. At Stuttgart though, we start off simple with a single Basic Weapons Factory and three Basic Weapons Labs. The fifth plot will be filled with an Ordnance Factory once we research that.
As we fiddle with our base layout, another mission becomes available.




As we touch down, mister human tells us about the possibly friendly, if unwashed, mutants we can expect to encounter.




My standard way of doing missions depend upon the formation of a firing line:



Here my troops are aligned, there are no threats currently behind me and I can concentrate on what might come from ahead. The troops are told to "watch" once they reach their destination, as that lets them react faster once an enemy becomes visible. In effect, it saves them from readying their weapon.



Here we've found a reticulan. It's alone, and only wielding an alien laser pistol. It dies quickly. The two small icons next to JoKas portrait tells us we're close to the civilian we need to evacuate, and that said civilian has Leader training. All buffs and debuffs currently in effect on a character is displayed in such a manner.





We're in luck! The civilian turns out to be a highly trained leader and commando both, and wields a katana! We use him to flush out and kill the remaining reticulans, making this mission a cakewalk from this point forth.





Once our rescued "civilian" reach the drop-pod, the mission ends. We get a good amount of experience and some precious power packs for our laser weapons.
The weapon labs are finally constructed and we can start research:





We will be wanting to pursue the AP ammo research as quickly as possible, as there will be more and more armoured enemies as the game progresses.
Soon, a new type of mission occurs.



Capture X missions can be frustrating later on, when you have to be careful you only knock the opponents unconscious and not kill them outright. At the present though, that's hardly a concern..



Also a recurring mutant, the Muckstar. Quite annoying as it's fast, has a long range attack, and is difficult to spot. It usually only takes a single shot to fell it though.



JoKa and Gondolin took some damage dealing with that Muckstar and one of its friends closeby, so Gondolin whips out his first aid kit and starts applying band-aids. Injury is divided into permanent, temporal and stun injury. Stun injury you recover from automatically. Temporal injury can be patched up in the field, and permanent injury is only permanent in the sense that you need hospital treatment at the Laputa to repair it. Sustain enough permanent injury, and you will not be allowed on the away team until you've recovered sufficiently.
A level 3 medic reduces the amount of time you need to spend in the hospital significantly, so I'm working hard at making korenzel hit that mark ASAP.





The opponent you need to capture is clearly marked with a red arrow, so once we hear movement and see the red arrow, we set up a firing line. And the Morelman only just reaches our line as he falls from the combined barrage. As you can see, his total max hitpoints is 3750. Not one of our soldiers can expect to gain that many hitpoints, and most start with 600-800.




The captured Morelman reached the drop-pod, and the mission ends. Once you've captured an opponent, he is your slave for the rest of the mission. There is no risk that they revert to their own side, but on the other hand, the rest of the enemy combatants will now target your captured slave as if he was one of your team. If he dies, you lose the mission.




We build the ordnance factory, but can currently produce nothing, as we haven't researched human weapons yet..
And finally, the last type of mission we can get reveals itself.



I will be showing you this in the next update.

 

[Kashmir Slippers]

Sign me up as a either a medic/technician or a scout/stalker if you have room or need for more. Human male.

 

[chzr]

chzr, human female, non derp face plz ( ) medic/trooper/sniper

 

[lightbane]

Some questions: Including the latest patch release and such, how many bugs does this game has compared with the average Obsidian game (in other words is it more or less playable)?? How horrible is the path-finding??

Oh, and please sign up my soldier as soon as possible:


Name: Claus
Specializations:
1. Cyborg
2.Technician
3. Whatever you want

for your efforts, I wonder how will you do it with Afterlight, that game had limited troops to "recruit", although it was fun to play. Unfortunately, I could not finish it due a fatal bug that prevented the final mission from appearing And the constant attacks were very annoying, at least the game was very easy to mod.

 

[Gondolin]

Apparently, me and korenzel can play doctor & nurse.

 

[korenzel]

Lost missions are lost, dead characters are dead.

As it should be

Those damn Muckstars, I remember they were two shotting my troops from afar, far beyond the range of the laser rifles I had. And Morelmen with grenades are all to happy to finish off downed troops...

 

[Cassidy]

Put on the reserves:

I hope at least someone will die. XCOM game without casualties:



Is there a power machete?

Name: Cassidy
Specializations
1. Cyborg Cybernegro
2. Sniper
3. Commando

*Edit: Wanted something different after realizing that combination was done already, so what about a balanced melee/ranged fighter?

 

[anus_pounder]

I just picked Stalker on a whim. If you have a better overall build, please change it as you see fit. I want a derp face, if possible.

Looks like definite over the prequel.

 

[Azira]

Cyborgs and train tracks

When we left off earlier, we had just received a distress call from the humans planetside. They wanted a group of civilians escorted to a safe area. Escort missions can be a blessing or a curse. They provide you with a couple of meatshields, that you have no control over, but can get in the way of enemy fire, but they can likewise block your line of sight. And if too many of them fall in battle, the mission is lost.



You do not get to choose where on the map you start. You always start at one of the edges, and the right-most character gets a large red arrow atop their sprite, to signify that this is the person the civilians are following.



Lead them to the other edge of the map, to a green exit area, and the mission is completed.



And as loot, we got our first smg, nice.
One of our advisors shares his insights.



What this boils down to, is that we can select the mission button in the geospace anytime, and click a territory adjacent to what we currently control, and we get a mission. If the territory is owned by a non-hostile faction (humans, cyborgs or psionics), there's a chance we get a help mission, and after the succesful conclusion of such a help mission, there's a chance that the territory becomes ours, and our relationship with the faction improves.
There's a bigger chance however, that the faction isn't in need of help, and the mission that spawns is a hostile takeover. In that case, you can decline the mission and nothing more happens. Should you take the mission though, your relations with the faction plummets, but a win means that you're guaranteed the territory.
We don't have to wait long for another rescue mission though.



The cyborgs make contact as soon as we make planetfall.




The mission is another escort mission and is quite easy.




I'm not sure what nuclear plant it is he's talking about. This mission was prompted by me clicking the mission button and selecting a cyborg owned territory. Maybe if I had waited, a specific mission involving a nuclear plant might have spawned. :mystery:
Anyhoo, we can now hire cyborgs!




And our PR guy seems mightily pleased.
Shortly thereafter our research project delving into the Laputa libraries bear fruit, and we get som exposition.





This short update concludes with a new concept. Those territories we have gotten under our control now either contains a base, or mines that are controlled from said base area. We can acces the output of a mine in an area where we do not control the base yet, if we build a railroad track there. Railroad tracks are also required to link up Stuttgart with new base areas.



This image shows the territories currently under our control, and I have built tracks from Stuttgart to Paris. We have also captured a base area in Riga, but that is still not connected. Railroad tracks cost maintenance. As you can see from the resource panel at the top of the screen, I'm now well off with both low-tech and high-tech supplies, but I haven't found an alien tech mine yet, and the single track I've built costs 5 alien tech supplies each hour to maintain. If the stockpile runs low, I will have to ask for resources from a friendly faction. Fortunately, the other factions never seem to run out, but we need better than neutral relations to request resources, and the better relations, the larger an amount of resources will be granted.
In the next update, I hope to have made contact with the Psionics. As it is now, only Bee has yet to be drafted of the volounteers. I would like at least one more psionic on the team. They have "psi sense" which lets them detect enemies through walls. It's very useful.