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[Rolan7]

It used to be true for terror attacks in vanilla, yes.  Word of Dioxine is that it still works for most mission types, but there are rare exceptions.  I *think* pogroms are an exception, for whatever reason, with Aircar Races being the much more obvious exception.

But "holding" missions with craft "en route" is such an official strategy that it has a Lore entry about it.  I forget what #.

[Nelia Hawk]

uff.. think i got quite some "problems" with that "lose morale each turn" stuff in piratez.
had one of the science zombie missions and grabbed 3 gals (others all wounded for weeks) and 3 peasants.
well few turns in the peasants go insane and panik over and over and are basically useless...
if i try to rush i get just eaten by the zombies in close combat... if i dont rush and wait more with guns everyone goes mad... sigh.

sort of savescummed that after 3 tries and just ignored the mission for now >.<

[sluissa]

That's how xpirates goes. It DOES throw stuff at you you can't handle... and you will have to make the judgement of when to just bail. Even some stuff you can handle will often still cost you so much in wounds and supplies that it might not be worth it.

Zombies are one of those things you'll want to bail from early on.

As for the morale, there's plenty of ways to handle it, from wearing the right clothes, to smoking cigarettes, to just killing enough stuff fast enough that your morale never drops. It is something to consider but it also gets easier once your gals bravery gets trained up a bit.

[Rolan7]

That's how xpirates goes. It DOES throw stuff at you you can't handle... and you will have to make the judgement of when to just bail. Even some stuff you can handle will often still cost you so much in wounds and supplies that it might not be worth it.

Zombies are one of those things you'll want to bail from early on.

As for the morale, there's plenty of ways to handle it, from wearing the right clothes, to smoking cigarettes, to just killing enough stuff fast enough that your morale never drops. It is something to consider but it also gets easier once your gals bravery gets trained up a bit.

Good advice.  To add, I've heard that bravery training is the same as in vanilla.  In a nutshell, bravery is trained by having their morale be below 50- every turn they manage to keep it together, they train bravery.  This is why certain morale-draining "armors" (which tend to be on the risky (sic) side) are suggested for bravery-training.

There's also the option of "slave soldiers", AKA males (I don't think they're really slaves if you take the male research route to hire them?).  They have stable morale, it doesn't drop over time.  Read into that as you will- I see my peasant-armies as nervous and my ubers as bloodthirsty, even though mechanically they lose morale the exact same way.

[Nelia Hawk]

even attack doggos panic every few turns XD

but yea still just like 3 weeks into this mod playthrough, so not used to all the new mechanics yet. the morale stuff might get "better" with later research or other items like the moonshine (well just +5 and kos people so doesnt sound that great).
the morale stuff seems a bit insane at the start haha

i did see one of the peasants get a +10 bravery though after a mission once too. so over time it might get better from that too.

atm running through a temple hitting everyone with bats (dont think i can hold that many prisoners though XD) while the doggo runs around insane most of the mission.

[Rolan7]

Technology only helps a little by providing some "basic training" options which boost bravery.  It's always going to be a thing, but your units naturally improve in bravery until it's much less of a concern.  It still happens on longer missions though, so it can be good to carry some alcohol (or just suffer it, because *usually* there are only pockets of relatively-weak resistance at that point).

This mod is extremely different from vanilla, for sure.  Your uber gals want glory or death!  QUICKLY!
...Though wat, dogs panicking?  I don't think that's ever happened for me.  A lot of your units died, I guess?  That'll shake even the male soldiers.

[AzyWng]

Using the dog's nose (which acts as a motion detector) drains its morale. Eventually, it'll drop low enough for panic checks to occur, and eventually it'll drop lower and you won't be able to sniff out foes at all (You get the message "You lack discipline!").

Quick question of my own: What are some good anti-armor options in X-Piratez? Preferably ones that don't require blowing things up (mainly because such devices are heavy and there's a risk of friendly fire).

[sambojin]

Lasers ignore a certain percentage of armour (33% usually). Might not seem like much, but on 100 armour guys, it makes it a lot more likely to get a high damage roll and get through.

Anything high damage works fine though (even solid cannonballs from an assault cannon).

Resists and the damage type your weapon does usually plays just as big of a part as the armour number when working out what's a good weapon against any particular foes though.

[lastverb]

Without other sources morale gets stable at 42-50 points on most armors (no stress modifiers). It can be that's for 100 bravery. I'm not sure and can't check now. Anyway, for that reason bravery is easily automatically trained. On top of standard <50 morale training bravery apparently bandages/medikits gives bravery training point each use (up to 11, which guarantees +10 gain).

[Rolan7]

HMGs and especially miniguns are pretty great against armor because they strip it with every hit, and fire a lot (especially miniguns).  HMGs also just do a lot of damage and are surprisingly accurate when crouched. 

In my first playthrough I used slugthrowers a lot against armor due to high damage, but their low rate of fire hurts them.  Using chem rounds can strip a lot of armor, though.  Chem grenades are probably great anti-armor, though they probably target under-armor most of the time so explosives are the best followup.

Plasma also strips armor and can cause burns.  It's relatively hard to get, except for the "Killer Bee" (used to be Hornet I think?) sold by Contacts: Smugglers.  Only 3 shots, but it's a compact and "affordable" emergency weapon.  The I-gun does a bit less damage and is less accurate, but fires about twice as much...  once you get Contacts: Authorized Dealers to buy the ammo.

The nice thing about "armor pre-damage" is that it strips armor even if it doesn't penetrate the armor.  That's why the 30-round-burst minigun is so great, every hit is taking off at least a little armor.

Oh and melee weapons tends to do massive, relatively reliable damage in strong hands.  The Spike Club is particularly good against armor, though it's concussive.  For some enemies (like lobstermen *shudder*) you really want a slicin' sword instead.

[sluissa]

I know the RPG also has special anti-armor ammo, and at least one of the shotguns has armor piercing ammo I managed to get ahold of a few rounds of... no idea how effective they are since I've yet to encounter anything that doesn't succumb to enough explosives that I didn't end up running away from.

Options open up as you research more, definitely. But it's really just a matter of paying attention to what you've got and picking the right weapon for the right situation. Also remember Ctrl + H after hitting an enemy if you're not sure. It'll tell you if you're doing any damage in rough terms. (0 = No damage, Hit = some damage, HIT! = A lot of damage.) If you see a few 0s show up with no hits, then maybe time to try a different tactic.

[Rince Wind]

It is not early game stuff, but the HEAT ammo for shotguns is amazing. Everyone can hit with a shotgun, as long as they are not too far away. And around 50 plasma damage, of course with the mandatory armor damage, kills most things quickly. It behaves like slugs, not pellets. But you'll get plasma pellet guns later (not that good, but nice to strip some armor).

[Iduno]

For some enemies (like lobstermen *shudder*) you really want a slicin' sword instead.

I remember from Terror From the Deep. They don't even flinch when you hit them in the face with the torpedo launcher (underwater rocket launcher). I want to melee them about as much as a tentaculat.

[Robsoie]

Lobstermen have a very high weakness to choking, something like poison grenade or hallucigen gas grenade works good against them.
Though poison grenade can be overkill considering how much a large zone it will cover

[Iduno]

Overkill? Now you're talking my language.