X-COM XCOM 2 + War of the Chosen Expansion Thread

[Jaedar]

Not really. Two action system actually makes you think what to do with it, how and where to maneuver. Instead of spamming whatever.

Anyone with half a brain actually played Xcom with a two action system by reserving movement points for kneeing and snapshot, but reason was actually not to shoot in your own turn. The reason was possible reaction fire which works best with TU left.

Xcom systems are broken beyond repair. Nucom is actually salvageable... though it wont happen.

Joined: Wednesday.

It seems the decline has reached strategy forum. Abandon all hope.

 

[Tytus]

Not really. Two action system actually makes you think what to do with it, how and where to maneuver. Instead of spamming whatever.

Anyone with half a brain actually played Xcom with a two action system by reserving movement points for kneeing and snapshot, but reason was actually not to shoot in your own turn. The reason was possible reaction fire which works best with TU left.

Xcom systems are broken beyond repair. Nucom is actually salvageable... though it wont happen.

Really needs a dumbfuck tag. Yes two action system, you misclick once and move the half of the distance you could with the first move and the entire first move is wasted - pure retardation. Action points are always better.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Not really. Two action system actually makes you think what to do with it, how and where to maneuver. Instead of spamming whatever.

Anyone with half a brain actually played Xcom with a two action system by reserving movement points for kneeing and snapshot, but reason was actually not to shoot in your own turn. The reason was possible reaction fire which works best with TU left.

Xcom systems are broken beyond repair. Nucom is actually salvageable... though it wont happen.

Really needs a dumbfuck tag. Yes two action system, you misclick once and move the half of the distance you could with the first move and the entire first move is wasted - pure retardation. Action points are always better.

The same could happen with AP.
If you are careless enough to waste moves like that, then that is your fault, not the game's.

 

[Tytus]

Not really. Two action system actually makes you think what to do with it, how and where to maneuver. Instead of spamming whatever.

Anyone with half a brain actually played Xcom with a two action system by reserving movement points for kneeing and snapshot, but reason was actually not to shoot in your own turn. The reason was possible reaction fire which works best with TU left.

Xcom systems are broken beyond repair. Nucom is actually salvageable... though it wont happen.

Really needs a dumbfuck tag. Yes two action system, you misclick once and move the half of the distance you could with the first move and the entire first move is wasted - pure retardation. Action points are always better.

The same could happen with AP.
If you are careless enough to waste moves like that, then that is your fault, not the game's.

No. If I click too close and move I will still have the set number of action points so I have not lost anything. With the two action system I'm fucked.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Not really. Two action system actually makes you think what to do with it, how and where to maneuver. Instead of spamming whatever.

Anyone with half a brain actually played Xcom with a two action system by reserving movement points for kneeing and snapshot, but reason was actually not to shoot in your own turn. The reason was possible reaction fire which works best with TU left.

Xcom systems are broken beyond repair. Nucom is actually salvageable... though it wont happen.

Really needs a dumbfuck tag. Yes two action system, you misclick once and move the half of the distance you could with the first move and the entire first move is wasted - pure retardation. Action points are always better.

The same could happen with AP.
If you are careless enough to waste moves like that, then that is your fault, not the game's.

No. If I click too close and move I will still have the set number of action points so I have not lost anything. With the two action system I'm fucked.

Except for the ability to aim, or prime and throw grenades in the first turn.

I will concede that the 2 action system is unforgiving towards mistakes, but the simple solution for that is don't make mistakes. Think carefully, then move.

 

[ArchAngel]

Not really. Two action system actually makes you think what to do with it, how and where to maneuver. Instead of spamming whatever.

Anyone with half a brain actually played Xcom with a two action system by reserving movement points for kneeing and snapshot, but reason was actually not to shoot in your own turn. The reason was possible reaction fire which works best with TU left.

Xcom systems are broken beyond repair. Nucom is actually salvageable... though it wont happen.

Really needs a dumbfuck tag. Yes two action system, you misclick once and move the half of the distance you could with the first move and the entire first move is wasted - pure retardation. Action points are always better.

The same could happen with AP.
If you are careless enough to waste moves like that, then that is your fault, not the game's.

No. If I click too close and move I will still have the set number of action points so I have not lost anything. With the two action system I'm fucked.

Except for the ability to aim, or prime and throw grenades in the first turn.

I will concede that the 2 action system is unforgiving towards mistakes, but the simple solution for that is don't make mistakes. Think carefully, then move.

Which is the opposite of the reason they are using it, to speed up the game.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Eh sort of. It takes longer to think, but not as much time to execute, as fewer clicks are needed and you don't have to count the squares.

 

[Raghar]

You could reserve time for a snapshot in UFO. Also it's quite trivial to color squares, or make a circle of movement and make it easy even with TU. TU were important for inventory management, and to force players think.

 

[Israfael]

Most of the alleged problems of the original game could be solved in a very trivial way:

a) inventory management is tedious? - Make the game remember the equipment layouts for all surviving toons, add hints for weapons aptitude (a la "Warning: this soldier has low strength to carry Blaster Launcher, he'll collapse senseless after X turns of running' / 'This soldier has high psy score, equip psi-amp? etc), add "save/load profile" functionality to switch between sets of gears. After all, some x-com ports already have some of this (check SMK's pocket UFO)

b) TU math is hard? Add grid highlighting (like in HoMM 3), create a comprehensive tutorial that will show what a reaction shot is, why it's important to understand that you don't have 360 degrees overview and so on.

c) Game is too slow? There's a slider for movement speed and aliens' turn speed, use it Luke! "Last alien hunt" problem can be solved by programming alien to either suicide (with 0 turn grenade in hand) or to give up to the X-com crew (if you want it the gamey way), or by adding 'autoresolve' button HoMM-style.

d) Psi is unbalanced? Decrease chance of possession, increase TU cost (already fixed in some ports), add something like "Perils of the Warp" (tm) (reversed possession and so on).

And this list can continue on and on. The fact is, Firaxis, instead of improving on UI's usability and providing general QoL improvement like the ones i listed, decided to go the easy way.

 

[Zeriel]

Long War actually has animation speed scaling under an obscure hotkey. It doesn't look very good at max speeds but people who want to enable that wouldn't care very much. I can't for the life of me figure out why developers don't put this stuff in as a baseline option in turn-based games when modders without an SDK or any documentation do so.

 

[ArchAngel]

Most of the alleged problems of the original game could be solved in a very trivial way:

a) inventory management is tedious? - Make the game remember the equipment layouts for all surviving toons, add hints for weapons aptitude (a la "Warning: this soldier has low strength to carry Blaster Launcher, he'll collapse senseless after X turns of running' / 'This soldier has high psy score, equip psi-amp? etc), add "save/load profile" functionality to switch between sets of gears. After all, some x-com ports already have some of this (check SMK's pocket UFO)

b) TU math is hard? Add grid highlighting (like in HoMM 3), create a comprehensive tutorial that will show what a reaction shot is, why it's important to understand that you don't have 360 degrees overview and so on.

c) Game is too slow? There's a slider for movement speed and aliens' turn speed, use it Luke! "Last alien hunt" problem can be solved by programming alien to either suicide (with 0 turn grenade in hand) or to give up to the X-com crew (if you want it the gamey way), or by adding 'autoresolve' button HoMM-style.

d) Psi is unbalanced? Decrease chance of possession, increase TU cost (already fixed in some ports), add something like "Perils of the Warp" (tm) (reversed possession and so on).

And this list can continue on and on. The fact is, Firaxis, instead of improving on UI's usability and providing general QoL improvement like the ones i listed, decided to go the easy way.

Open Xcom has parts of a)
Xenonauts has most of a)

Open Xcom and Xenonauts has b)

Open Xcom has options to nerf Psi, Xenonauts has no Psi powers for the humans.

 

[Israfael]

Yes, well, it all illustrates my point quite well.

Also, for the people who think Jake Solomon is the saviour or that he got trampled by the execs at Firaxis:

There’s also this effect that design-wise, I’m not like a hardcore strategy fan. I know that this sounds weird, I’m not sure how this is going to come off, but I’m not the most hardcore strategy fan there is. I certainly like Civ, and I actually worked on Civ Revolution with Sid. But I think that there’s a danger in genres sometimes, and I think you see this with strategy games as a whole actually, where the people who love strategy, a lot of times the design defaults to ‘well if you like this, we can give you more of that.’ What you need is more in-depth and what you need is more ‘we can simulate more of this’ instead of trying to pull back and say, try to make a game that I think operates on simpler principles.

It’s not because I have some deeper understanding of design or anything, I think I honestly benefit from the fact that I’m typically not the smartest guy in the room, I’m pretty much a lowest common denominator-type guy. And so for me I love Sid Meier type games. Sid’s brilliant, but his brilliance is that he tends to focus on simpler systems that then hopefully create complex behaviour.

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/01/15/firaxis-jake-solomon-post-mortems-xcom-part-two/

 

[Galdred]

Actually, TU vs 2 actions is more a question of what is the right level of micro management in such a game. As I said, you can replace the TUs with a penalty to accuracy depending on the distance moved, and the end result would be the same (except for people who are not good at multiplying things).

 

[Raghar]

Game that tries to simulate more, is more fleshed out game. And the crime of adding more of that... Do you remember Dark Souls games? "the more of that" number of weapons... Weapon diversity was awesome.

There is definitely need for creating diversity, and to simulate more weapons in detailed tactical squad games like this. Look for example at the most close remake. At the start you have shotgun, and assault riffle as default weapons. Shotguns with slugs are great at range, and assault riffles with burst fire are nice close. (And of course there are also grenades, and rocket launchers with different often inefficient ammunition.) When they would streamline it, it would be primitive crap. But with all this ammunition problems, maintenance cost problems, balancing manufacturing capacity and budget, and when you sell all buildings and equipment at the beginning and build it anew, it's actually quite enjoyable. http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/ufo-extraterrestrials (Don't pay for this game, they don't deserve it because they didn't hire me as a consultant, and they have crap programming skills. Also don't isntall expansion, it adds only tedious stuff (and alien ship swarms which are nice, but you'd have your difficulty because you'd be behind expected position on difficulty curve, because you sold these building at beginning and delayed yourself a lot.))

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Most of the alleged problems of the original game could be solved in a very trivial way:

a) inventory management is tedious? - Make the game remember the equipment layouts for all surviving toons, add hints for weapons aptitude (a la "Warning: this soldier has low strength to carry Blaster Launcher, he'll collapse senseless after X turns of running' / 'This soldier has high psy score, equip psi-amp? etc), add "save/load profile" functionality to switch between sets of gears. After all, some x-com ports already have some of this (check SMK's pocket UFO)

b) TU math is hard? Add grid highlighting (like in HoMM 3), create a comprehensive tutorial that will show what a reaction shot is, why it's important to understand that you don't have 360 degrees overview and so on.

c) Game is too slow? There's a slider for movement speed and aliens' turn speed, use it Luke! "Last alien hunt" problem can be solved by programming alien to either suicide (with 0 turn grenade in hand) or to give up to the X-com crew (if you want it the gamey way), or by adding 'autoresolve' button HoMM-style.

d) Psi is unbalanced? Decrease chance of possession, increase TU cost (already fixed in some ports), add something like "Perils of the Warp" (tm) (reversed possession and so on).

And this list can continue on and on. The fact is, Firaxis, instead of improving on UI's usability and providing general QoL improvement like the ones i listed, decided to go the easy way.

Open Xcom has parts of a)
Xenonauts has most of a)

Open Xcom and Xenonauts has b)

Open Xcom has options to nerf Psi, Xenonauts has no Psi powers for the humans.

Yeah, Open Xcom had the features I was looking for.
It also has an option that requires double clicking before moving or shooting, so no more accidents.
Can't wait for the TFTD version.

 

[sser]

Xcom systems are broken beyond repair.

How quaint that a game with two decades worth of staying power is broken beyond repair.

Most of the alleged problems of the original game could be solved in a very trivial way:

a) inventory management is tedious? - Make the game remember the equipment layouts for all surviving toons, add hints for weapons aptitude (a la "Warning: this soldier has low strength to carry Blaster Launcher, he'll collapse senseless after X turns of running' / 'This soldier has high psy score, equip psi-amp? etc), add "save/load profile" functionality to switch between sets of gears. After all, some x-com ports already have some of this (check SMK's pocket UFO)

b) TU math is hard? Add grid highlighting (like in HoMM 3), create a comprehensive tutorial that will show what a reaction shot is, why it's important to understand that you don't have 360 degrees overview and so on.

c) Game is too slow? There's a slider for movement speed and aliens' turn speed, use it Luke! "Last alien hunt" problem can be solved by programming alien to either suicide (with 0 turn grenade in hand) or to give up to the X-com crew (if you want it the gamey way), or by adding 'autoresolve' button HoMM-style.

d) Psi is unbalanced? Decrease chance of possession, increase TU cost (already fixed in some ports), add something like "Perils of the Warp" (tm) (reversed possession and so on).

And this list can continue on and on. The fact is, Firaxis, instead of improving on UI's usability and providing general QoL improvement like the ones i listed, decided to go the easy way.

http://openxcom.org/

 

[Black]

Xcom systems are broken beyond repair.

Please, what's fubar'd that can't and hasn't already been fixed by Open X-Com?

 

[Israfael]

why developers don't put this stuff in as a baseline option in turn-based games

cause of 'muh immershun'

2All:
I don't really understand why you all link openxcom in answer to me, i was talking specifically in reference to Firaxis and their 'beta testers' who couldnt figure out the timer on grenade in the original system.

 

[Zeriel]

why developers don't put this stuff in as a baseline option in turn-based games

cause of 'muh immershun'

2All:
I don't really understand why you all link openxcom in answer to me, i was talking specifically in reference to Firaxis and their 'beta testers' who couldnt figure out the timer on grenade in the original system.

But it's an option. What sort of casual dives into an advanced options menu to turn something on, then complains about it?

(I suspect the real argument is "that takes a few hours of engineering time, and we aren't willing to pay literally $100 out of a multi-million-dollar budget for a feature that only grogs care about.")

 

[Black]

People don't care about beta testers because brain-dead morons should never be your audience around which you build your games.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

All of you are complaining about EUs tactical map, when you should really be disappointed in the strategy layer.
I think we can all agree that the geoscape in EU really fucking sucks.

I really hope they don't drop the ball that badly in XCOM2.

 

[Zeriel]

All of you are complaining about EUs tactical map, when you should really be disappointed in the strategy layer.
I think we can all agree that the geoscape in EU really fucking sucks.

I really hope they don't drop the ball that badly in XCOM2.

Yeah, this is what I've said since the beginning. There are some downgrades in the simulationist perspective in the tactical combat, but it's in the geoscape where the gamist approach over simulationist really starts to kick you in the balls and make you want to die.

 

[Israfael]

But it's an option. What sort of casual dives into an advanced options menu to turn something on, then complains about it?

Well if they thought about it, then there wouldn't be stupid cutscenes in the game, over-the-shoulder chase camera on every second run from point A to point B, snarling sectoids (what a joke) and so on. And besides, if a casual sees a slider 'game speed' in the options, he'd probably max it out like all other settings

 

[Zeriel]

But it's an option. What sort of casual dives into an advanced options menu to turn something on, then complains about it?

Well if they thought about it, then there wouldn't be stupid cutscenes in the game, over-the-shoulder chase camera on every second run from point A to point B, snarling sectoids (what a joke) and so on. And besides, if a casual sees a slider 'game speed' in the options, he'd probably max it out like all other settings

 

[Black]

Its all about the assburgers imagination, they cling obsessively to certain things.

Oh, you could've said in the beginning that your argument in "nostalgia goggles".