Okay, I'm finally back in town again--haven't touched a computer (or any piece of modern technology for that matter) in almost two weeks
Just thought I'd say this-- I would totally contribute if you opened up to donations, and I'm sure others would too. It can't hurt, right? A project as amazing as this deserves funding.
You're just in time then, because I was going to do this some time in the next few weeks when I get a chance. I've been getting e-mails along these lines as well. We'll see how it goes.
How far are we from a randomized campaign ?
Far-ish? Hard to say because it really depends on how fast development can proceed, which is an unknown right now due to insufficient funding. (Those damn aliens taking over countries!)
Although this can't tell you precisely when to expect them, to summarize the general direction of development before that stage: Next we have a new expanded UI, followed by a more proper implementation of battlescape features to replace existing placeholders, and *then* we get a geoscape which would naturally include campaigns. Campaigns really are towards the end of the whole thing though, since they encompass just about everything, although there's a good chance I'll implement a simpler version before that point for testing purposes. Check out the
roadmap for more near-term details. It's updated fairly frequently.
On a side note, a few weeks ago I was getting into brainstorming/researching the geoscape.
Been playing some more, and seeing as I never played the original, I have some stupid questions:
1.Do operatives shoot less accurately when using their off-hand?
2.Does putting objects in your off-had decrease the effectiveness of your usual one?
3.Do aliens wake up from unconsciousness, and if so, how can I execute them or at least fully incapacitate them when they are unconscious?
Oh, and UFO hull breachers don't work on the ufo roof. Is this intentional? I wanted to fly my general in through a hole in the top for the lulz.
1. No. Soldiers are Ambidexterity.
2. While I haven't confirmed this, I always believed using a two handed weapon with one hand reduced accuracy. So throwing a grenade while holding a rifle would reduce the accuracy of the throw. On the other hand, using a pistol, a one handed weapon, wouldn't do this. This may not be even true, but I like to do it for RP reasons nevertheless.
3. Yes, aliens can wake up from unconsciousness. However, if you kill an alien, he's down, unlike in some other versions of X-Com. If you want to kill one completely, you can simply toss a grenade on top of the corpse. I think shooting at the tile also works.
Orb pretty much covered this, though I'd add for #2 that two-handed weapons used in one hand (other occupied) *does* reduce accuracy by 10%. This important tidbit is hidden away in the readme file, and is pulled from the original game.
As for your last point about hull breachers, it is somewhat unintentional that they don't work through roofs, due to how they were implemented (quick and dirty). They unfortunately only work on adjacent hull walls in the same plane
spoilerish
Is it just me or are the sectopods much tougher than the colossus, even the armored ones? I killed all 3 Colossus of the mission after failing to deactivate the power cores and still could not dent the sectopod.
It's true that sectopods have a good bit more armor than a colossus, and may in many cases be harder to kill. This is a side-effect of X-COM explosion damage mechanics whereby the larger an object, the more damage it takes because it takes the explosion damage separately to each and every section of its body within the radius. Thus properly placed explosions can do a hell of a lot of damage to huge enemies. I don't believe the colossus is properly balanced, since I just copied the old design and upped its armor a bit, but back when I first designed it I wanted to rely mostly on HP rather than armor so you could still whittle it down with lots and lots of standard ammunition. Ideally the upgraded version should have lots more armor and lower HP, but that would require too much testing so I went the easy way on that just to get the mission out there.
The best way to kill a sectopod would be to get yourself some heavy plasma guns to bypass the armor.
oddly, 1 of the three destroyed big guys is not counted, i wonder if it has to do with it possibly dying from the added fire/each rounds from the gunner flame ammo ?
The added sound has been helpfull to take notice of the HQ messages.
X@COM is such a fantastic game
Glad to hear you're still having a good time with it! You're correct, death by fire will not count towards your score since you're only credited for direct kills, e.g. projectiles and explosions. Fire is a good way to damage them, though, which you've obviously discovered.
While playing "A Rookie's Tale" (didn't played it before, it's utterly awesome how much different a game from another can be in this mod !) i found something that is working oddly :
While investigating a "special" location i found 2 armor racks, having my guy and an ally fighter having poor armor, i decided to fetch the Ring armors that were in.
I moved my weapons and secondary items in the backpack (as you need 2 free hands to remove and put armor) and removed each of my guy's armor then dropped them on the ground.
Then i took the Ring armors, made my guys to wear them and noticed with horror that i had no more weapons or anything in my backpack anymore, they just vanished ?
After being puzzled and moving around to see if they were not somewhere in the ground i noticed what was the problem : the actual backpack is in fact oddly fused with the armor instead of being something separate, so if you drop an armor, the backpack drop with it
Fortunately i just had to put back the old armor to find again my items (and drop them on the ground then instead of putting them into the backpack) and switch again to the better armor
Yes, your sack is considered a part of your armor due to how armor mechanics work (they weren't really meant to be removed in the first place... the idea is that "armor" is not a one-piece thing, but a set of things). What will normally happen when you remove armor is any items it contains are immediately dropped to the ground--items are not really stored in the armor itself. So when equipping new armor you just have to pick up any other dropped items you want. You shouldn't need to re-equip the old armor.
I like how you mention the mod makes it a very different game, since that was the goal of RT, and in the future I'm sure we'll see modder contributions in a similar vein. While the core mechanics stay the same, swapping out content combined with extensive use of the effect scripting system can make for some interesting results.
Isn't a bit too much to have Chrysalids being able to appear in Rookie's Tale ?
Yes, it can be. They don't always go on a rampage, since there's only ever a maximum of one on the map (to start), if any, and it doesn't move unless a target appears nearby. If you're as unlucky as you were, perhaps some creativity with the right spells can still win the day (if you're lucky enough to have access to good spells). Be sure to check the Rookie's Tale guide I posted after release.