Lobsterman Commander/Synomium Device?

[Midgar]

I just started the second part of my colony assault, I've honestly been reloading and loading trying to find the room with the commander and the device with no luck. Can anyone direct me as to where it is? I've heard it is on the lowest level and I've been searching down there, is it always in a specific part of the map on the lower level? Any tips would be great as to its location. Also, as far as capturing a Lobsterman Commander goes, I'm guessing I'll have to stun him and carry him back to the start point? Sounds like a suicide mission to me, no idea how stun resistant they are since it's my first time playing. I don't have M.C. control yet, all I'm packing is two Sonic Tanks and 6 guys, 3 of which only have tazers with Sonic Cannons, I have a single guy with that launcher that allows you to direct the torpedo.

[Bomb Bloke]

Battlescape maps are made up of modules, each placed randomly in a grid. Modules don't stack on top of each other, though, so if you recognise the top layer of a module, you'll know what lies on the lower levels.

 

The module which contains the synomium device is 20x20 tiles. It has an empty top level. Third level contains a row of pink things that pump up and down, and six rows of three purple spheres a little further to the south. The second level contains three small inaccessible rooms and two holes that let you see into the first level; one of these has a staircase leading down, the other of these is in the direct center of the module and directly above the synomium device (you can throw grenades and stuff down the hole, try and slam-dunk your directable disruptor pulse in there, or just ignore it).

 

The first level itself has two doors on either side of the aforementioned staircase, which lead into a small chamber with the synomium device. Fair warning, there're multiple lobstermen in there, all valuable research specimens.

 

If you manage to incapacitate all aliens on the map, you win, same as usual, and collect all loot within the base (which is destroyed regardless as to whether you took out the synomium device manually or not).

 

If you lack the firepower to pull this off (lobstermen take loads of damage), you can indeed collect your prizes by hauling the unconscious aliens back to the lifts. Aborting will still see the base destroyed if you dealt with the synomium device, but you'll only get the loot you dragged out with you.

 

Lobstermen are quite suspectable to the thermal shok launcher they often carry (the explosive stun weapon), and tend not to hesitate to fire it at point-blank range at your troops (often knocking themselves out in the process). Units are knocked out when their stun level exceeds their current health, so if you cripple an alien with regular damage, less stun damage'll be required to bring it down.

[Midgar]

Thanks, I found him though finally looking at some pictures of what the area looks like that it's in. It ended up being quiet easy after I got two soldiers down to level two, blew a hole in the floor with the launcher and went directly down to the synomium device and stunned the commander several times.

[silencer_pl]

One more advice - if you are only going for the device - on top floor there are 2 ion generators that have zerbite. shoot the block that has this yellow thing under it and pick up the zerbite. On the report it will not show - but your stores will increase by 100 Zerbite. On map they will have + sign as if there was an object to pick.

[Midgar]

Thanks for the tip, I really am getting sort of low on Zrbite. I let a alien colony stick around earlier, hoping some ships will land nearby so I can raid them for Zrbite, I didn't know about this tactic until today and I'm already in August -_-.

[silencer_pl]

That would require Hyperwave decoder (or Participle something something in TFTD) - that gives 100% detection. With normal sonars you're just 30% chance of detecting supply ship - and even so - supply ship isn't that easy like in EU.

[NKF]

Plain sonars do fine as long as they are in range of the colony. The supply ship should stay long enough in the radar detection zone for the half-hourly checks to spot it, especially when landed. But true, these things have aliens with DPL launchers on - which does make it for a very nice catch once you can handle them.

 

Zrbite-wise, shooting down the plain old Cruisers is a very good way to get 50 Zrbite with minimal opposition once you are all teched up and have a Displacer or two.The zrbite is stored in the tail of the ship (the small pointy end) as opposed the Ion Beam Accelerators, and will not get blown up when the sub is shot down.

 

NKF

[Tsathoggua]

Also, try sending displacer tanks right up in the face of the lobsters carrying a visible shock launcher, they often still fire it point blank, not affecting the tank at all almost all of the time (I just had a sonic displacer tank STUNNED for the first time ever today, but before I could send someone to look over it and search it for a weapon, etc. Some inconsiderate, innacurate shooting swine managed to screw up and let a disruptor pulse launcher off in their own face, right next to the KOed tank.

 

Unfortunately having to play it on a laptop with a really crap touchpad, oversenstive and has troops running round corners like complete morons, having no idea whats lurking round there quite often, going haring off doing things they were never meant to do.

[magic9mushroom]

I suspect Midgar isn't in need of advice on this matter anymore; it's been 3 1/2 years.

 

But insofar as general advice goes, the preferred loadout for Alien Colonies is probably a drill in one hand and a Sonic Pistol in the other. You need the Sonic Pistol in the first half, and to shoot Tentaculats in the second half (the Pistol is one-handed and fires faster than the Cannon), and the drill is for the Lobster Men themselves. I'd generally only bring one Displacer; they're great in the first half, but they won't be able to get around easily in the second, and getting outflanked by Tentaculats is not very pleasant.

[Tsathoggua]

I still prefer the cannon later on in the game, once the aquanauts are experienced enough only the weight matters really, because they get good enough eventually to attain between 110-120% accuracy even firing two handed, more or less removing (IMO) the advantage of the faster pistol with the heavier damage. With the pistol the you'd have to plug a tentaculat with both shots, possibly the third if your pretty unlucky, whereas with the cannon shot no.1 usually is enough to take the tentaculat out.

I don't think I've ever seen one survive two cannon shots to need a third though.

 

And tentaculats, and 'pleasant' generally shouldn't even be allowed to share a seabed together, let alone a sentence. The only sentence that is shared with 'pleasant/good' and tentaculats, is a capital one.

 

Displacer/sonic tanks do have the advantage of a hefty magazine capacity though, and can get off three shots if they have full TU, so you can afford to have them simply blast their way through if something gets in the way, that sonic turret can make a pretty good mess of most internal wall structures in a base second floor. Far better to have one displacer at least, for breaching entryways if nothing else.Takes a few shots, and isn't as dramatic as using explosives, but at least you get more death for your dollar once you punch a hole in a wall separating your teams from a room full of hostiles, letting off the DPL round you would have used to breach the walls off on the interior side, you still get your Bloody Big Hole, but at least doing it that way the wall doesn''t insulate the enemy from the blast and you get body count as well as blown in walls.

 

I sometimes use the strategy of taking two sonic tanks, and loading the remaining men only with DPLs, a couple of stun launchers, a few stun rods/medkits, one motion scanner and the rest DPLs, ammo, gas cannons ( my aquanauts like using them right on throughout the war, using a WP or HE loadout..and pulse grenades. Anything gets in the way of the tank gets either blasted through by the tanks, or blown to kingdom come by sappers a pair of drills is helpful just in case ammo runs low, but generally reliance is on capturing enemy weapons after mowing them down with overwhelming force

[magic9mushroom]

I still prefer the cannon later on in the game, once the aquanauts are experienced enough only the weight matters really, because they get good enough eventually to attain between 110-120% accuracy even firing two handed, more or less removing (IMO) the advantage of the faster pistol with the heavier damage. With the pistol the you'd have to plug a tentaculat with both shots, possibly the third if your pretty unlucky, whereas with the cannon shot no.1 usually is enough to take the tentaculat out.

I don't think I've ever seen one survive two cannon shots to need a third though.

 

The issue with Sonic Cannons is the massive time per shot. You're only getting one shot from a Sonic Cannon per turn, and you have to stay nearly-immobile to get even that if using Aimed Shots (you can't get over 80% with Snap Shots while carrying something in the other hand). One shot with a Sonic Pistol's better than none from a Sonic Cannon.

 

From the front, one Sonic Pistol shot won't kill a Tentaculat, but it's under 50% for a Cannon hit to kill as well. From the back, the Cannon goes up to about 70%, but a Sonic Pistol hit can kill 20% of the time as well.

 

And tentaculats, and 'pleasant' generally shouldn't even be allowed to share a seabed together, let alone a sentence. The only sentence that is shared with 'pleasant/good' and tentaculats, is a capital one.

 

I'm pretty sure capital punishment isn't pleasant either?

[Tsathoggua]

Well properly trained agents can get mighty high accuracy. My longer running game, most are running over 110% for aimed. No MC capability for any of them, damn tech tree, but they make up for it by having constantly trained, my current team, I have one base full of total rookies, trying to train them although they are dropping like flies, but my primary base, the squad is a displacer tank and a bunch of hard-bitten bastards that chew up nails and shit barbed wire. And MC or no MC, send the enemy panicking like crazy, because they are almost entirely armed with sonic cannons, gauss pistols for sidearms, packing pulse grenades, and in the other hand either drills, DPLs and as many shells as can be carried with a weapon in each hand, those guys often pack no sidearm, just a heavy sonic and DPL, or sonic cannon, vibroblade/tazer and gauss pistol, or sonic cannon, a bunch of grenades, a gas cannon and medkit. One of the team takes point behind the tank and carries a gas cannon and motion scanner. Anything pops up and isn't accounted for, out come the sonic pulsers and DPL shells fired into the dark. Getting quite good too, at if something does burst out and end up sitting next to my aquanauts, firing a DPL from afar, and having the blast radius end right on the enemy, and not touch the imperiled aquanaut.

 

And I did not mean being on the receiving end of capital punishment. I meant as in, using a tentaculat's anal sphincter as a post box for mailing a DPL round express delivery

 

 

Not being able to move far if you want to get off two cannon shots (experienced and strong aquanauts only, but some damn neat sniping is possible)

 

I like gas cannons for dealing with the tentaculats though. One agent seems to think she is the reincarnation of rambo, charging the things with a GC in each hand and a drill in the backpack, raining HE and WP shells as she does, right and left alternating...with a satisfying *whump..whump...whump....spllat* usually. If not theres always sniper cover if she runs dry of TU. As well as two guys with DPLs who always move last. and potentially covering fire from the tank.t

 

Gas cannons are great right on into the campaign imo, for experienced agents. Good for dealing with stunned low value targets too, just drag them to the same place

pile up the bodies and send the whole damn lot straight to tartarus.

 

 

Displacer/sonics are brilliant for base assaults. Theres no worry about running dry of ammo, so they work well for blasting holes in things and clearing a path, and with the three shots per turn, can LEVEL a tentaculat if it shows its beak anywhere near the operatives. Even tasoth and lobstermen don't stand up to that, blasting at close range.

[NKF]

Tsathoggua, I lay down the challenge of creating a divergent save of your current game and replace most of your Sonic Cannons with Sonic Pistols. I recommend at least keeping the cannons for a couple of dedicated floating snipers or new recruits, but let your most accurate aces handle the pistols and watch them go. Kneel often for the best results. Lobstermen shouldn't be too much of a problem if you're already using other tricks to take them down quickly and efficiently.

 

One way to help stop thinking of the Sonic Pistol as the black sheep of the Sonic weapon family is to consider that it has the same 80 average damage as the old Plasma Rifle from UFO.

 

- NKF

[Zombie]

One way to help stop thinking of the Sonic Pistol as the black sheep of the Sonic weapon family is to consider that it has the same 80 average damage as the old Plasma Rifle from UFO.

 

Except (as I'm sure you are well aware) the Sonic Pistol lacks an Auto Shot, has 8 fewer shots per clip and has a 15% less accurate Aimed Shot. Not to mention that the aliens eventually phase these weapons out, so once your ammo stockpile is gone, you'll need to manufacture more.

 

- Zombie

[magic9mushroom]

Except (as I'm sure you are well aware) the Sonic Pistol lacks an Auto Shot, has 8 fewer shots per clip and has a 15% less accurate Aimed Shot. Not to mention that the aliens eventually phase these weapons out, so once your ammo stockpile is gone, you'll need to manufacture more.

 

- Zombie

Of course, nothing in TFTD holds a candle to the UFO Plasma Rifle. There simply isn't a weapon with equal Auto/Snap accuracy, or equal clip size, and in addition everything has either markedly less damage (Gauss Rifle) or markedly less rate-of-fire (Sonics).

[NKF]

Except (as I'm sure you are well aware) the Sonic Pistol lacks an Auto Shot, has 8 fewer shots per clip and has a 15% less accurate Aimed Shot. Not to mention that the aliens eventually phase these weapons out, so once your ammo stockpile is gone, you'll need to manufacture more.

 

- Zombie

 

I was over half an hour into quite an elaborate explanation of all sorts of things including the difference in performance between the and what the TFTD's 50% - 150% Sonic damage roll does for the Sonic Pistol. Why it would be a better sidearm than the Gauss Pistol. An unfair analogy of it being a superior pocket-edition of the Heavy Gauss. How aliens armed with pistols tend to be much more dangerous than the ones with cannons. Etc, etc. By the time I realised I was missing the point, I just cut it back to what you see above. My aim was to indicate that the Sonic Pistol does punch reasonably above its perceived weight in that each bullet hits about as hard as a Plasma Rifle.shot.

 

As for making the ammo, I find TFTD to be a bit more generous with its Zrbite than UFO is with Elerium, so you can usually afford to build plenty of Pistol Power Clips to keep you going by the time the aliens phase the pistol out of use. There's no shortage of Sonic Cannons you can always fall back on if you do run out

 

- NKF

[Tsathoggua]

Trooper L ''Tsathoggua'' Rett, Reporting Commander.

 

If somebody will only sign these papers and get me out of the infirmary, or slip me a thermal tazer in a really long 'sub' sandwhich (meatballs, triple quadruple cheese on italian herb and cheese, with enough black olives is a good bet, now that I can eat again), if anybody is taking notes.....

 

Because Tsath' doesn't know which of the on-base medic teams is responsible for the policy that troops have to fill their medikits themselves personally, but just turn off that motion scanner for a moment because these are not the bio-drones you are looking for while he gets out of bed and stops a few things dangling in the wind.

And if those things sound like several doctors being defenestrated then it isn't, alright?it just sounds that way.

 

 

And he should pop by the MC lab on his way out, because he at least owes a particular squad ldr. this 'ere tray of steaming roast arms, legs, fingers and a fancy cocktail with an eyeball stuck on the end of a wee pointy stick that has a paper umbrella on the other end, a fat doob and a blast on the foil of the x-com kit equivalent of whatever the hell was was in that little wrap from that tassie's own PERSONAL medkit, plus certain....''unorthodox''..training, now that Tsathoggua has grown back most of the relevant skin. That bugger's analgesia kit must be some stroooong stuff to have kept him under since last thursday,christ! no wonder some of them get seen on the battlefield shrugging off sonic cannon fire and DPL rounds like they were made of beryllium aerogel wrapped in bog roll and mounted on a stick, flicked from an angler's catapult

 

*mutters something shockingly vulgar under his breath in the tasoth dialect about his assigned base doctor, gross incompetence, corticosteroids, anticonvulsants and what wasn't the quietly enunciated ASL signs and where needed, the letter-signs for 'feed to tricenes' 'spleen' and 'fucking bastard(s)' and while picking his teeth using something that really bears not the smallest resemblance to a shard cut from one of the long bones of a human thigh.*

 

WHAT??? its been a long, and horribly traumatic extended weekend:(

 

 

Say, how do I load the tritons main gun again? and wheres the nearest thick concrete wall so as to get some practice in on the firing range;) nobody even told me it HAD one when I enlisted!

 

 

 

 

As far as sonic pistols go, I tend to build up a stockpile, once rifles become available, because they quickly become the primary troop loadout, alongside gas cannons (of course. I use the gas cannon right as long as there are troops alive to fire them , especially as its the only option available that can fire a WP round on terrestrial missions. Personally, I think the omission of any form of incendiary grenade was an egregious oversight, fail-up and fuckure! damn, thats one weapon that REALLY should never have been left unavailable, hades, there should have been more than just the gas cannon, hydro-jet and incendiary torpedoes,and all the more so considering that two out of three are only fireable in the aquatic environment, barring react-fire. And there is absolutely nothing whatsoever in the way of WP rounds for a coelacanth or displacer chassis either under OR above water.) and gauss pistols.

 

(saying nothing of course, of the fact that to prevent WP igniting, I STORE it in jars full of ordinary, clean water. Nothing special, just a coffee jar, pot, tub or whatever, full of tap water, after first boiling the water to degas it and prevent it slowly oxidizing and my ending up with a bunch of H3PO4. And it you light a little piece of WP or RP then it simply goes out.

[the black allotropes I have never actually personally handled, but from what I know about them, black phosphorus is not flammable, its more like graphite in behaviour and character than it is anything like similar to red or white, and presumably, scarlet. Wouldn't surprise me if its not something like the violet allotrope, or perhaps the other one known as violet, that Hittorf prepared by dissolving phosphorus in molten lead, keeping it stewing in the same for a little short of a day and night, or two days if you actually want to get any sleep; before taking it off the heat, letting the molten lead cool and then dissolving it away with concentrated nitric acid.

 

The reason I've never gotten to actually have a sample of either of the crystalline forms, is that they require a combination of high temperature (which is doable enough) and very high pressure (which is much much MUCH harder to achieve; and I cannot very well go around setting off high explosive charges in a domestic setting, not any more, now I'm old enough to get strung up by my danglies for it, don't have a license to store HEs either, or the place to put secure locked cabinets etc. And its really the only way I can see of doing it, heating a sample of WP or RP held between two impacter plates/rods and setting off a shaped charge placed one either side so as to drive them towards each other, subjecting the phosphorus sample to extremely high, if very brief pressure, just like 'little boy', the uranium 'gun' type nuclear bomb that was dropped during WW II on hiroshima (nagasaki was attacked with a different design, the so called 'fat man' that was based upon plutonium-239 rather than 235U, The gun design doesn't work for plutonium-based physics packages; not that thats very surprising, as the physical properties of metallic plutonium are apparently pretty funky when they get to very very high pressure and temperatures such as are to be found within the innards of a Pu-based pit, there are quite a few allotropes that only occur under such conditions, as well, IIRC as some oddball rheological properties and Pu can only be used in implosion-type devices, as I understand it, a gun-design would simply result in liquid plutonium squirting out of the sides when the two halves get belted together)

 

Not, mind you, that black P takes anything so damn vicious, high temp/pressure yes but not THAT high. I could buy myself a piece, but then what would be the point of doing that?

 

To me, none. If I needed it to make something of some kind, catalytic something or other, engineering project then yes, sure, if its just to go into the preparation of a functional item. But for the collection, then no. I like to make my elemental samples, not simply buy them, theres nothing rewarding in merely forking out a sum of money in order to have them, theres no need to research, nothing to learn that isn't just taken off the web or my books, there can never be an enjoyment of the mineral prospecting (here, I DO allow myself the purchase of a compound of the element if I must and cannot find some in natural sources, but I only do so for a simply have-able source of the atoms of the element in some guise or other then there comes the refining down, concentrating etc, making amenable to manipulation in practice as well as theory; and the thrill and excitement of the hunt, the chasing, and eventual, hopefully, the overcoming of technical aspects presenting challenges, and running the element down as a game hunter would do with an animal, and perhaps, where some exist, the best part of all, the beavering away at the fruits of my labor, to prepare as many of the allotropic forms as there can be had, with reasonable possibility (E.g, that sadly rules out the likes of ultrahigh-pressure things, stuff thats too unstable to exist at all outside of transient intermediate species or within the context of extreme dilution and inert environment like one finds in space, and things that just turn right back to what you started with the moment you take your eyes off the ball so to speak, although the latter I still find worthy quarry even though I cannot keep them once I've attained them, I'd feel....unsatisfied, were I to simply ignore the difficult ones that I cannot keep captive.

 

. I don't hunt animals unless I must eat, and cannot afford any food. And if I DO kill something then I do not wish to waste anything worth eating, won't kill if I do not fully intend to consume the thing caught. Even then, I do so to put food in my mouth and upon my table, and quite honestly I hate doing it. But I also hate going hungry until my stomach hurts, not so much a problem now but there have been some meager pickings and tough times in the past for me; and if an animal must die that I may yet live, so be it. I choose MY life, not theirs. Although I also despise and will never, EVER tolerate cruelty by another, nor will I engage in it myself. I hate few things with such a virulent, vitriolic loathing as I feel for the filth that abuse animal life, if something has to meet its end to keep my belly full, then it'll happen, sure, but it also has to do so quickly and with as little suffering as can be meted out, granted its never a kindness save for something injured so critically as to face no chance of ever doing aught but suffer, I cannot help that and have the creature remain safe/palatable to eat, but it must be quick and it must keep misery to a bare minimum.

 

(I have always, always been an animal lover. I've taken in many more than I have ever taken out, so to speak. And if in the past I have had nothing but a few coppers, then they get spent on my charges, should I be looking after the stragglers of the natural world, and my pets, they, not I, am the priority and the stomach of import, nad the receiver of comfort, if there is only sufficient comfort on offer for one. Like my last cat, before she died, when ALL that I had, was either enough for cat food and cat litter, sasha...or slasher, as she was affectionately known, the little wee beastie horror that she could be when she worked herself up into a pissy mood:P:D Loved her for it...or in spite of it, more like;) got the chow, the litter and the toys, while I made myself do without [well not that I use cat litter haha, at least, I don't crap in a tray full of it, makes an alright adsorbent for extractions of some kinds, in the case of the right kind of litter, like diatomaceous earth] and I have absolutely zero use for toys of any sort, at least not what other people, or kids think of as toys eheh. My 'toys' are my lab glass, the microwave oven, (not the kitchen one, I have one dedicated to being used for my projects, and I sure as bejeezis wouldn't want to want to eat out of it! not when I know too well what kind of things its earmarked for doing and containing and the associated implements, like my little autoclave that I 'inherited' from my dad when he bought a new one for his circuitry geekage, once that got retired (the oven, not my old man, he's still as alive as he was then, I just inherited it in the sense of it being passed down to me for my lab once he got one more to his liking for whatever it is he does in it (beats the hell out of me, the what he does with it, not my dad I mean!), or the rotary-vane vacuum pump and bottle of pump oil he bought me for my birthday the other year; that sort of thing.

 

But nothing wrong with my doing it (the hunting, chasing, butchering things for sources of the chemical elements, not like they can suffer, well not much, I've put some through a fair amount of hell, I admit, in the reaping of my harvests. Nothing like a big ol' load of thermite for isolation of metallic prey (which is what X-COM forces SHOULD be using as aquatic incendiary weapons, unlike WP, thermites DO burn under water, and will keep burning until either they burn themselves out or the charge is small enough and the body of water large enough, afaik, that the temperature is dropped sufficiently, with the water acting as heatsink, to pull away the activation energy needed to sustain the rxn. I however, lack the means to ascertain this analytically. In any case, thermites ARE pretty bloody well proficient at making a helluvamess of hardened targets under water, and once started, rarely ever are, or can be stopped. Not so much MY use though, I use the metal/metal oxide redox systems of that sort for preparation of metals otherwise tough buggers to yank free from their compounds, or on occasion, to weld things together using a mold with a hole in the bottom in order to let the molten metal pour through in/on where I want it to go, whilst retaining the oxidey slag and generic crap that is left behind for reprocessing into other things.)

 

 

I wonder, if X-COM allows its science teams to tool up and run field outings?

 

Or if I'd have to build a coelacanth/displacer with a pilot seat or bribe an engineer to do the same, to my design scheme and sneak off. Can't say I'd be very fond of the potential to get left on the seabed though. High and dry. Only neither as well as both !! if the squads have to beat it and make for the nearest exit not infested with killer alien critters packing heavy weapons.

 

 

 

Hm...I just thought of another something that was left out and shouldn't have been.

 

FLAMETHROWERS! and flamethrower tanks. Both for land use of course. (and shotguns, but flame throwers definitely, you just can't go wrong with a flamer (well not the kind that shoot fire anyhow lmao). That would have been just perfect in the first alien war and for land missions during the second, when it comes to needing to flush a secturd/aquaturd into the hereafter. Couple of squaddies with a SPAS-12 and one with a flamer, maybe a thermobaric/incendiary grenade through the UFO door, and anything that avoids ending up as squelchy fog is going to come legging it (if the bug in question 1-is of a species or design that has legs and 2-hasn't just had them blown off mind you) out of the door to avoid being blown to meatpaste by further grenades, only to run straight into the guys carrying the flamer and the shotties, and get shredded.

 

Would have been immensely satisfying to loose on charging chryssalids, especially given the panic effect of flame weapons, good for driving back all manner of nasties. And they don't come much nastier than chryssalids and tentaculats, Makes me think of that coal chamber song....know the one? 'the roof, the roof, the roof is on fire.,..we don' need no water let the mother fucker BURN! )

 

Doubt civilians would appreciate it too much when WP shells and grenades start pouring through their bedroom windows, but a few firebombs would be perfect on those bloody cruise ships, especially for those rare occasions when one finds a triscene having spawned in a space too narrow for its egress. Just toss in a couple of flame grenades, shut the door on it again and leave it to burn alive like a wog troast t, trapped in the flames. MMMmmm yum hows about that..triscene scratchings, triscene chops, take those deep-one/craft PWT cannon off and slice nice and thin, give it a soak in some NaNO2 and KNO3, some salt and you got the beginnings of the X-COM christmas BBQ if the biotech guys defrost that xarquid they were keeping on ice in case it was needed again out from containment and make some mutant freak nautilus calamari :D:D:D

 

(mind you I don't know if you can eat nautilus. Although there aren't very many poisonous members of the order Cephalopoda, only the blue ringed octopi of the genus Hapalochlaena and one cuttlefish, that I know of, although bathyal/abyssal specialists need to avoid freezing and being crushed by the environmental conditions and the usual strategy is to pack the body full of di/tri-methylamine and ammonia, so the the giant squid and colossal squid are pretty much certain to be pretty foul, and nasty ass shit for eating. Probably not lethal, unlike the octopi, not sure what the cuttlefish's toxic strategy is.)

 

Still, bet theres a lot of meat on a xarquid if they are good eating ^_^

 

 

 

Hm...now I just had a thought.

 

React-fire. THAT is where sonic cannons come into their own. For nasty little buggers like xarquid, lobstermen and biodrones that are probably going to ignore a sonic pistol shot and carry on regardless, especially in the case of the bio-drones they are just so damn fast that one does not want to be the aquanaut who has to plug a drone with a sonic pistol, because you just know the Styx-begotten little svinya is going to whip round and start raining down sonic fire, and knowing what those hell-born things are like, probably slug you straight in the eyes with their lethally accurate, return fire saying nothing of the power of their ranged weapon (and from what I read, of the close quarters strike if the randomizer code flips the coin and fate determines in favour of the drone, is bloody powerful is it not?)

 

At least with heavy sonics theres a fair chance of taking down maximum priority, extreme threat targets of the kind which need taking out before they ever get a shot off, or ever get within 50 map tiles of an aquanaut, lobstermen and tassies probably the lowest of the low end of priority targets, followed by high-ranking aquatoid psykers (easy enough to give the interior of a dreadnaught a new lick of....yes, paint, thats what it is. Paint. Got it? PAINT.....), then the xarquid, triscene respectively, and the bio-drones and tentaculats, both must be about equally the worst of a particularly pestilent bunch. Well, aside maybe from the tassie commander should one ever turn up. But for entirely different reasons, never seen one caught alive, don't want to; if I do, then the policy is one of cold blooded murder while they are unconscious, dumped on top of a demo pack or pulse grenade and sent back to hell shrieking. Stop 'em, drop 'em and slop 'em *grins a cold, nasty icy little grin, the sort of grin that says 'I microwave kittens and eat old people. And sometimes if I get bored, I change the order round)

 

(Out of curiosity, answer me this: Do tasoth cmndrs possess potential as psykers? compared to a squad leader of the species, how much of a threat are they in combat, assuming equivalent weapon and ammunition loadouts? I know about the research tree bug, but I'm only speaking of their acute combat threat level.

 

And, once they have been duly extirpated, they lose any rank tagging by the AI don't they? that is to say, there is no risk of killing one and taking a no-longer-identifiable logic bomb back to containment, and then buggering the campaign up completely if one has not yet necropsied a tasoth, without having to clear out containment of ALL tasoth corpses to make sure that the thing doesn't 'go off' so to speak, like a string of bad electro-sausages only worse. With corpses they are essentially no longer considered as (former) beings, but as items, are they not?

[magic9mushroom]

As for making the ammo, I find TFTD to be a bit more generous with its Zrbite than UFO is with Elerium, so you can usually afford to build plenty of Pistol Power Clips to keep you going by the time the aliens phase the pistol out of use. There's no shortage of Sonic Cannons you can always fall back on if you do run out

 

- NKF

 

Agreed. Cruisers always giving 50 Zrbite even if shot down is the big one, but there are a few others, such as the Survey Ship carrying Zrbite (while the Small Scout doesn't), and the much better Zrbite haul from an Alien Colony Assault.

 

As far as sonic pistols go, I tend to build up a stockpile, once rifles become available, because they quickly become the primary troop loadout, alongside gas cannons (of course. I use the gas cannon right as long as there are troops alive to fire them , especially as its the only option available that can fire a WP round on terrestrial missions. Personally, I think the omission of any form of incendiary grenade was an egregious oversight, fail-up and fuckure! damn, thats one weapon that REALLY should never have been left unavailable, hades, there should have been more than just the gas cannon, hydro-jet and incendiary torpedoes,and all the more so considering that two out of three are only fireable in the aquatic environment, barring react-fire. And there is absolutely nothing whatsoever in the way of WP rounds for a coelacanth or displacer chassis either under OR above water.) and gauss pistols.

 

(saying nothing of course, of the fact that to prevent WP igniting, I STORE it in jars full of ordinary, clean water. Nothing special, just a coffee jar, pot, tub or whatever, full of tap water, after first boiling the water to degas it and prevent it slowly oxidizing and my ending up with a bunch of H3PO4. And it you light a little piece of WP or RP then it simply goes out.

[the black allotropes I have never actually personally handled, but from what I know about them, black phosphorus is not flammable, its more like graphite in behaviour and character than it is anything like similar to red or white, and presumably, scarlet. Wouldn't surprise me if its not something like the violet allotrope, or perhaps the other one known as violet, that Hittorf prepared by dissolving phosphorus in molten lead, keeping it stewing in the same for a little short of a day and night, or two days if you actually want to get any sleep; before taking it off the heat, letting the molten lead cool and then dissolving it away with concentrated nitric acid.

 

The reason I've never gotten to actually have a sample of either of the crystalline forms, is that they require a combination of high temperature (which is doable enough) and very high pressure (which is much much MUCH harder to achieve; and I cannot very well go around setting off high explosive charges in a domestic setting, not any more, now I'm old enough to get strung up by my danglies for it, don't have a license to store HEs either, or the place to put secure locked cabinets etc. And its really the only way I can see of doing it, heating a sample of WP or RP held between two impacter plates/rods and setting off a shaped charge placed one either side so as to drive them towards each other, subjecting the phosphorus sample to extremely high, if very brief pressure, just like 'little boy', the uranium 'gun' type nuclear bomb that was dropped during WW II on hiroshima (nagasaki was attacked with a different design, the so called 'fat man' that was based upon plutonium-239 rather than 235U, The gun design doesn't work for plutonium-based physics packages; not that thats very surprising, as the physical properties of metallic plutonium are apparently pretty funky when they get to very very high pressure and temperatures such as are to be found within the innards of a Pu-based pit, there are quite a few allotropes that only occur under such conditions, as well, IIRC as some oddball rheological properties and Pu can only be used in implosion-type devices, as I understand it, a gun-design would simply result in liquid plutonium squirting out of the sides when the two halves get belted together)

 

Not, mind you, that black P takes anything so damn vicious, high temp/pressure yes but not THAT high. I could buy myself a piece, but then what would be the point of doing that?

 

To me, none. If I needed it to make something of some kind, catalytic something or other, engineering project then yes, sure, if its just to go into the preparation of a functional item. But for the collection, then no. I like to make my elemental samples, not simply buy them, theres nothing rewarding in merely forking out a sum of money in order to have them, theres no need to research, nothing to learn that isn't just taken off the web or my books, there can never be an enjoyment of the mineral prospecting (here, I DO allow myself the purchase of a compound of the element if I must and cannot find some in natural sources, but I only do so for a simply have-able source of the atoms of the element in some guise or other then there comes the refining down, concentrating etc, making amenable to manipulation in practice as well as theory; and the thrill and excitement of the hunt, the chasing, and eventual, hopefully, the overcoming of technical aspects presenting challenges, and running the element down as a game hunter would do with an animal, and perhaps, where some exist, the best part of all, the beavering away at the fruits of my labor, to prepare as many of the allotropic forms as there can be had, with reasonable possibility (E.g, that sadly rules out the likes of ultrahigh-pressure things, stuff thats too unstable to exist at all outside of transient intermediate species or within the context of extreme dilution and inert environment like one finds in space, and things that just turn right back to what you started with the moment you take your eyes off the ball so to speak, although the latter I still find worthy quarry even though I cannot keep them once I've attained them, I'd feel....unsatisfied, were I to simply ignore the difficult ones that I cannot keep captive.

 

. I don't hunt animals unless I must eat, and cannot afford any food. And if I DO kill something then I do not wish to waste anything worth eating, won't kill if I do not fully intend to consume the thing caught. Even then, I do so to put food in my mouth and upon my table, and quite honestly I hate doing it. But I also hate going hungry until my stomach hurts, not so much a problem now but there have been some meager pickings and tough times in the past for me; and if an animal must die that I may yet live, so be it. I choose MY life, not theirs. Although I also despise and will never, EVER tolerate cruelty by another, nor will I engage in it myself. I hate few things with such a virulent, vitriolic loathing as I feel for the filth that abuse animal life, if something has to meet its end to keep my belly full, then it'll happen, sure, but it also has to do so quickly and with as little suffering as can be meted out, granted its never a kindness save for something injured so critically as to face no chance of ever doing aught but suffer, I cannot help that and have the creature remain safe/palatable to eat, but it must be quick and it must keep misery to a bare minimum.

 

(I have always, always been an animal lover. I've taken in many more than I have ever taken out, so to speak. And if in the past I have had nothing but a few coppers, then they get spent on my charges, should I be looking after the stragglers of the natural world, and my pets, they, not I, am the priority and the stomach of import, nad the receiver of comfort, if there is only sufficient comfort on offer for one. Like my last cat, before she died, when ALL that I had, was either enough for cat food and cat litter, sasha...or slasher, as she was affectionately known, the little wee beastie horror that she could be when she worked herself up into a pissy mood:P:D Loved her for it...or in spite of it, more like;) got the chow, the litter and the toys, while I made myself do without [well not that I use cat litter haha, at least, I don't crap in a tray full of it, makes an alright adsorbent for extractions of some kinds, in the case of the right kind of litter, like diatomaceous earth] and I have absolutely zero use for toys of any sort, at least not what other people, or kids think of as toys eheh. My 'toys' are my lab glass, the microwave oven, (not the kitchen one, I have one dedicated to being used for my projects, and I sure as bejeezis wouldn't want to want to eat out of it! not when I know too well what kind of things its earmarked for doing and containing and the associated implements, like my little autoclave that I 'inherited' from my dad when he bought a new one for his circuitry geekage, once that got retired (the oven, not my old man, he's still as alive as he was then, I just inherited it in the sense of it being passed down to me for my lab once he got one more to his liking for whatever it is he does in it (beats the hell out of me, the what he does with it, not my dad I mean!), or the rotary-vane vacuum pump and bottle of pump oil he bought me for my birthday the other year; that sort of thing.

 

But nothing wrong with my doing it (the hunting, chasing, butchering things for sources of the chemical elements, not like they can suffer, well not much, I've put some through a fair amount of hell, I admit, in the reaping of my harvests. Nothing like a big ol' load of thermite for isolation of metallic prey (which is what X-COM forces SHOULD be using as aquatic incendiary weapons, unlike WP, thermites DO burn under water, and will keep burning until either they burn themselves out or the charge is small enough and the body of water large enough, afaik, that the temperature is dropped sufficiently, with the water acting as heatsink, to pull away the activation energy needed to sustain the rxn. I however, lack the means to ascertain this analytically. In any case, thermites ARE pretty bloody well proficient at making a helluvamess of hardened targets under water, and once started, rarely ever are, or can be stopped. Not so much MY use though, I use the metal/metal oxide redox systems of that sort for preparation of metals otherwise tough buggers to yank free from their compounds, or on occasion, to weld things together using a mold with a hole in the bottom in order to let the molten metal pour through in/on where I want it to go, whilst retaining the oxidey slag and generic crap that is left behind for reprocessing into other things.)

 

Okay, you've been going on about how white phosphorus doesn't burn underwater for quite a while now. I let it pass before because I was intimidated by your rather large post sizes, but I see you're going to keep talking about it until I point this out.

 

The I-can't-believe-it's-not-incendiary rounds in TFTD are referred to as phosphor-tipped, not phosphorus. A phosphor is in precise chemical usage a substance that exhibits phosphorescence and in broader, common parlance simply any substance that glows in the dark (it's from Ancient Greek "phosphoros" = "light-bearing" - phosphorus, the element, was named because white phosphorus glows in the dark). The adjectival form "phosphorous" is kinda bad and confusing, certainly, but I don't see any evidence that they're supposed to be white phosphorus in particular, just something that glows (like the chemical flares).

 

Hm...now I just had a thought.

 

React-fire. THAT is where sonic cannons come into their own. For nasty little buggers like xarquid, lobstermen and biodrones that are probably going to ignore a sonic pistol shot and carry on regardless, especially in the case of the bio-drones they are just so damn fast that one does not want to be the aquanaut who has to plug a drone with a sonic pistol, because you just know the Styx-begotten little svinya is going to whip round and start raining down sonic fire, and knowing what those hell-born things are like, probably slug you straight in the eyes with their lethally accurate, return fire saying nothing of the power of their ranged weapon (and from what I read, of the close quarters strike if the randomizer code flips the coin and fate determines in favour of the drone, is bloody powerful is it not?)

 

At least with heavy sonics theres a fair chance of taking down maximum priority, extreme threat targets of the kind which need taking out before they ever get a shot off, or ever get within 50 map tiles of an aquanaut, lobstermen and tassies probably the lowest of the low end of priority targets, followed by high-ranking aquatoid psykers (easy enough to give the interior of a dreadnaught a new lick of....yes, paint, thats what it is. Paint. Got it? PAINT.....), then the xarquid, triscene respectively, and the bio-drones and tentaculats, both must be about equally the worst of a particularly pestilent bunch. Well, aside maybe from the tassie commander should one ever turn up. But for entirely different reasons, never seen one caught alive, don't want to; if I do, then the policy is one of cold blooded murder while they are unconscious, dumped on top of a demo pack or pulse grenade and sent back to hell shrieking. Stop 'em, drop 'em and slop 'em *grins a cold, nasty icy little grin, the sort of grin that says 'I microwave kittens and eat old people. And sometimes if I get bored, I change the order round)

 

This isn't how it works in practice.

 

Normally, in the open, you're using sniper-spotter tactics and most of the shooting in your own turn is done by snipers shooting from beyond visual range (and thus, with immunity to reaction fire). Your spotters will do most of their shooting with reaction fire during the alien turn, and the Sonic Pistol is much more flexible in that regard because of its lower cost to fire; if a soldier has already expended 60% of their TU moving, they cannot fire a Sonic Cannon in reaction even if they get a chance. For an 80-TU veteran, to retain enough TU to turn and fire an Aimed Sonic Cannon shot requires that he move no more than five steps - if he has a Sonic Pistol, he gets to move seven steps while reserving enough TU for two Snap shots and thirteen with enough TU for one.

 

In close quarters, you can't use snipers and as such reaction fire is a concern. However, in close quarters, you'll in all likelihood be carrying a drill in your other hand, making the Sonic Cannon no more accurate than the Pistol, and making the Pistol's rate of fire begin to dominate in terms of damage per turn - two Sonic Pistol hits are, after armour, roughly 120 damage, while one Sonic Cannon hit does roughly 110.

 

Sonic Cannons are worth using as sniper rifles, certainly, as they get 100% accuracy while kneeling very early on and you find a lot of clips for them (although at extreme accuracies - over 110% - the Sonic-Blasta Rifle gives some competition since its Snap shots hit 100% while kneeling and you can fire twice per turn). Cannons do also have a significant advantage against Xarquid due to their heavy armour, but they still usually fail to kill in one hit and Xarquid are accompanied by Gill Men against which Sonic Cannons are massive overkill while Pistols are just right (there are other ways of dealing with them, too; handing one of your snipers a Gas Cannon, for instance, or giving your Sonic-Pistol-equipped front-line soldiers a drill in their other hand). Triscenes' armour is far too heavy to be worth bothering with Sonics at all; you need at least six hits from the Cannon even if they all roll max and a more likely number is thirty. You have to use the kryptonite Gas Cannon (with HE rounds) or Sonic Pulsers to kill those on Veteran+ difficulties.

 

(Out of curiosity, answer me this: Do tasoth cmndrs possess potential as psykers? compared to a squad leader of the species, how much of a threat are they in combat, assuming equivalent weapon and ammunition loadouts? I know about the research tree bug, but I'm only speaking of their acute combat threat level.

 

And, once they have been duly extirpated, they lose any rank tagging by the AI don't they? that is to say, there is no risk of killing one and taking a no-longer-identifiable logic bomb back to containment, and then buggering the campaign up completely if one has not yet necropsied a tasoth, without having to clear out containment of ALL tasoth corpses to make sure that the thing doesn't 'go off' so to speak, like a string of bad electro-sausages only worse. With corpses they are essentially no longer considered as (former) beings, but as items, are they not?

 

Nobody has ever confirmed a Tasoth Commander to exist in final-release (DOS with the 1.2 patch, or Collector's Edition) TFTD, so we have no idea whether they have MC capability. Or, for that matter, if they actually look like Tasoths, or what corpse they leave (if any). I agree, however, that if you do encounter one and kill it, whatever corpse you get should be safe to autopsy.

[Kir'jaeden]

How the posphour could be flaming underwater? how an aquanaut can throw grenade across half of map being underwater? How disrupter torpedo explosion, which is able to evaporate a tank, doesn't harm the units 1 level above or below the explosion level? Simple answer: TFTD physics is goofy.

[Tsathoggua]

]']I'll say, Kir'jaeden.

 

Although I probably should say, that actually it wasn't my intent to..'go on' about that burning thing. I had honestly, not remembered that I'd said something before. Although I raise my hands (once finished ducking out of the LOS of the odd bio-drone, lobbie,or stupid motherf...... civilian before the temptation to reach for that gauss pistol/rifle and send them to Osiris:P)

S

Memory encoding/stability has been worse than it usually is, even. Just had a referral to a specialist when I saw a doctor about some autoimmunity crap thats been afflicting me particularly awfully over the weekend. MASSIVE stress, and stress always makes the memory issues worse than they already are. Its gotten to the point where I rarely buy more than a single piece of perishable food, and if I do so, I must consume it immediately upon walking back through my house door, or things can go and get very very very expensive in terms of food wasted for I cannot eat it, not knowing if its been there minutes, or hours, or months, and I never can know if its safe for me to eat or not. Whatever the cause, its progressing fast, to my doc, I compared it to having had a pack of rabid, half-starved mink loosed within my body, whilst it eats itself from the inside out. Started a few years ago and while I noticed at the very first; things like absent-mindedness, it rapidly turned to seizures, myoclonus, severe anterograde amnesia post initiation of problems, problems with visuo-spatial processing, and whilst already badly dyscalculic (that bit is nothing new under the sun, I do remember this, though: since primary school, since first ever attending a school at ALL, I've always had the math difficulties, and never actually got any help for that. In a somewhat rare moment where I've been able to laugh about that, I have to really, given the sheer irony of it; but 'choosing' chem/biotech and neuropsychopharmacology and med tech as my main hobbies, (ethno)-mycology and ethno-botany, at least require little math. And ironic as hell that I take such an interest in developments in the fields of condensed matter and particle physics. Really the only way I get anywhere there is because of another personality trait thats been with me since I first dropped out of the womb and started crying because my book had gotten stuck at the cervix. And that, I raise my hands and say 'mea culpa, mea maxima culpa, is sheer, unadulterated, concentrated essence of bloody-the-Styx-well-mindedness hahaha I don't really have it in me to beat a retreat, not when I want something so badly ) [as evidenced by the occasional mission serving with X-COM forces, where I've been the last, and armed with nothing but a gauss pistol and spare mags, a stunner and various grenades as scavenged off the corpses of my fellow soldiers, and of the corpses and KOed bodies of the enemy, and having the ability, research tree wise to use only the sonic pistol and pulsers, as far as alien tech goes, after things have gone monumentally south in a hurry, the only other unit remaining, being, thankfully, a coelacanth/gas cannon, and wearing plastic aqua armor. Sneaking around in a terror mission gone not so much pear-shaped, as bringing the entire frickin' orchard

 

And using single, aimed shots to provoke the lobbies and biodrones, as well as grenades to flush them out and help cut their health down to size sufficiently, if not to kill them outright, but to bring them close enough to jump them with the thermal tazer, pile the bodies up like a medieval plague pit and blow them all to perdition, capturing as many sonic pistol power cells as possible, to give myself just that fighting chance, especially where bio-drones are concerned. NOBODY wants to get close enough to one of those things to be within tazer arse-zapping range Even the coelacanth would probably turn pale if they were equipped with a cardiovascular system at the thought of that. Especially if your the only one left living of the whole damn squad, the tank not counting, because it isn't alive.

 

But I do admit to this too: like oh so many other scifi fans, trekkies (of which I am assuredly one), star-wars geeks etc, analysis of the physics that would have to lie behind the technology used, that comes on instinct, every bit as much as popping the tab on a can of drink when I thirst, or opening some dried/canned food when I get hungry and can remember what to do about it.

 

PhosphoUR(S) glow when excited by existing energy used to pump them, and need contain no P atom in their structure. Lanthanide (aka the 'rare earth' elements are the most commonly encountered ones used in phosphors, europium is particularly common seemingly, or at least 'fashionable', so to speak. Used a fair bit in monitors for things like computers and CRT TV screens)

 

PhosphorOus, denotes phosphorus (the element, oxidation state 0) compounds having the P atom in the +3 oxidation state, such as phosphorous acid, H3PO3, while phosphoric (V) acid is H3PO4. Theres a whole bunch more, P likes to form oxyacids, hell it just likes to oxidize in general . And likes to oxidize bugs just as much in doing it.

Mmmmm...who's up for some broiled lobsterman, slow-cooked in the shell, with a nice tangy piquant hint of phosphoric acid dressing? Finger lickin' good. Hope its easier to get the best bits of the meat out than the terrestrial variety, fiddly little sods that they are.

 

Throwing grenades under water without some kind of launcher? yup, goofy physics alright.

 

As for the way explosions spread out, thats entirely doable. Shaped charges are pretty effective in directing the blast from an explosive, I've seen an uncontained charge (a primary explosive in this case, it was a tetraaminecopper complex I'd been buggering about with back in my teenage pyro fascination days, the perchlorate, IIRC) just go up with a loud bang, a hole of reasonable size and a mess, when let off in the open standing on a metal plate, nothing massively thick, or obscenely strong, just a few MM of iron/steel scrap. Stuck the same stuff at a pretty similar size of charge in a shaped liner, to funnel and direct the blast, and the result was FAR more efficient, cut straight through.

 

The militaries of the world use shaped charges all the time, they aren't what you could call new or complicated, at least the basic principle isn't, of course theres been a lot more gone into making actual weaponized munitions, than a simple container and liner. Although I've read some stuff about iraqi jihadist vermin types experimenting with their IEDs and doing some pretty horrendous damage with the likes of something like a can, with a metal curved (inwardly) metal plate, having a gap between the charge and the plate and the explosive-lined can its stuck in, so that when fired, the blast reaches the deepest point of the 'dish' shaped plate first and simultaneously blows it outwards and melts it, forming a really high-velocity 'spike' of burning molten metal. Apparently the things can do some pretty heavy-duty wrecking and show damn good armor penetration (depending on who you ask mind you. Effective would be more accurate, unless one happens to be a jihadi scumbag, good, as long as your not the one driving the armored vehicle it just blew chunks off that is).

 

I think the effect might be something similar to those RPG type rounds that use an explosive-lined hollow cone in the nose of the rocket which is designed to go off moments before impact, the result is an explosively formed and propelled jet of burning molten metal traveling at an absolutely insane velocity, thats intended to burn through the armor of a hardened target before the round itself impacts, allowing the blast of the main charge to go off inside the vehicle. Nasty, but very effective.

 

Whilst I've never tried blowing up a shaped charge under water, and my pyro days were in my teens and younger, I don't see why it wouldn't work, at least to a degree. I'd imagine the blast itself is attenuated as long as there is water in the space (if there is one) between the shock-front of the blast and the target, but I think the principle behind shaped charges itself would hold true. Not that a DPL torpedo really NEEDS much enhancing, they seem quite capable of making a big enough mess of things already as they are:D

 

What surprises me most with those things is the way one finds the odd lobsterman or even more surprisingly, tasoth, still with both legs standing on the sea floor, and not several miles apart from each other

 

Bet their ears ring a bit after that though!

 

Oops...part of something else saved/cached and abandoned/forgotten looks like it decided to automatically paste itself back in to the post. Oh well. Thats why I forgot. Damn autoimmune flareup/seizure crap. The weekend gone was bloody awful for about 90% of it.

[NKF]

nd using single, aimed shots to provoke the lobbies and biodrones, as well as grenades to flush them out and help cut their health down to size sufficiently, if not to kill them outright, but to bring them close enough to jump them with the thermal tazer, pile the bodies up like a medieval plague pit and blow them all to perdition, capturing as many sonic pistol power cells as possible, to give myself just that fighting chance, especially where bio-drones are concerned. NOBODY wants to get close enough to one of those things to be within tazer arse-zapping range Even the coelacanth would probably turn pale if they were equipped with a cardiovascular system at the thought of that. Especially if your the only one left living of the whole damn squad, the tank not counting, because it isn't alive.

 

Funny you should bring that up. Being in close range with a Bio-Drone is probably one of the safer places to be when fighting them. They tend to engage in melee combat when you're up close. Due to having practically no melee accuracy, their chance of hitting you is quite terrible. More than likely a bug, but a most fortuitous one considering how deadly the Bio-Drone is at range.

 

On getting into close range combat in general: Having some reserve troops back in the Triton use an MC Reader to check the stats of the enemies can be a great help when deciding whether or not to get close to an enemy. You use the MC Reader to check the TUs of the alien to see if there is any possible chance that it will be able to react. If it can't, then you can step right up next to it and attack away without fear of retaliation until the next turn. Best for drill or tazer combat, but can be used to fire any weapon at point blank range.

 

Regarding the earlier mention of better reaction shot weapons - I'll give both the Sonic Cannon and Sonic Pistol bouquets for being good reaction fire weapons, but for different reasons.

 

The Sonic Cannon obviously for its accuracy and power, but amusingly also for how slow it is. The 50% cost for taking a snapshot is hefty, but it also means you must end the turn with at least 50% of your TUs to even be able to react. This is good, since your ability to react is your reaction score modified by the percentage of remaining TUs. So you will have at least 50% of your reaction score to work with. The pistol however requires a minimum of 30%. You can end the turn with more TUs, but if you were relying solely on the 'reserve for snapshot' button, then you might end up with only 30% of your reactions and trigger your reaction shot later rather than sooner. The 50% firing cost is also good for you because it means aliens armed with Sonic Cannons have a good chance of not being able to react after they've moved.

 

The Sonic Pistol is a good reaction fire weapon because of its speed, You can either be more mobile and still save for one shot, or you can stay still and get lots of shots. This improves your chances to hit one target at least once or even redistribute the damage over several targets. You may not always be able to take down the enemy instantly but you will get the side benefit of exercising your Reaction skill a bit more than you would with the Sonic Cannon.

 

- NKF

[Tsathoggua]

Thats one thing I like about the gauss pistol/rifle, the speed of the things, although you might not get to finish the enemy outright, there is at least a good chance of squeezing a fair few rounds off.

 

Personally I like to force my troops, once they already have some practice and are halfway decent, to use a two-handed weapon one-handed, that way they start getting proficient nice and quick, well they do if they want to go back home with both arms and legs in the same place they were when the aquanaut left for there mission.

 

If doing that, does the lower accuracy end up, once one maxes out whilst encumbered, and then taking away the sidearm, then going over the usual limit?

If not then I might just rethink my policy on the...steep learning curve.

 

 

 

I agree about the biodrones obviously, right up in their 'face' is the best place to be, short of behind a building/troop transport and tossing grenades like a sneaky little swine, using a tank to pop round the corner a bit and take a look, drawing the reaction fire from behind as much cover as possible until you know the drone has blown its load, so to speak, before anybody living peeps round and pops off as many shots as can be gotten off without compromising the ability to get back into cover again, lather, rinse, repeat until the drone is destroyed.

 

Up close works alright, but that doesn't address the issue of getting there. You might be alright (probably) when your there. But crossing the distance is likely to get the aquanaut sent back home in a box, given how damned fast and accurate the drones are. Those things don't mess about when theres a massacre up for grabs.

 

Not got any psionic tools in my older game at all, only resistance training. The newer one is too new for that, don't think I've actually even faced MC being used against me. Seen a very few aquatoids, but none of them have even managed to get a shot off before being taken out. Other than that, its gone straight from gill men to lobsters. Not encountered any other species yet, save for the associated terrorists, managed to bag a deep one thankfully, and otherwise, its been straight up lobbies and drones.

 

Starting to warm to a couple of weapons I'd previously pretty much ignored entirely. Namely the dye grenades and hydro-jet cannon. Cover and saving civilians until they can be prodded with the tazer (charming I know, but they are too stupid to live otherwise), and for the latter, peppering the area with willy pete rounds, especially in night missions. Too bad about the aquatic use only. Why X-com couldn't have hung on to a few autocannons I really do not get. Would have made sense. And the rocket launchers for that matter. Doesn't make much sense to have abandoned them totally when its blatantly obvious the bugs aren't playing by the same rules.

 

Although the lack of disruptor pulse launchers above the surface is one small mercy, at least.

 

You talk of using any weapon at point blank range after the bio drones expend their TU. Do you mean to say they are unable to selfdestruct after discharging their weapon fully? the implication being the explosion is the result of the AI processing it as a weapons discharge? thats just what I wanted to know earlier, if thats the case, as to who gets the credit/pays the price for splattering civilians when a drone goes kablooey courtesy of X-com weapons fire. Still wouldn't mind confirmation of that though, knowing how squirrely the AI is in TFTD. Its got to be THE most bugged, twisty and altogether buggered game mechanics of anything I've ever played, bar two that COULDN'T be completed, one of them completely impossible, the other requiring a simple but still rather creative hack on my part to get past a bugged point. But for sheer variety of ways to get its panties in a knot then TFTD definitely takes the prize (amongst other things taken, so to speak:P)

[NKF]

Thats one thing I like about the gauss pistol/rifle, the speed of the things, although you might not get to finish the enemy outright, there is at least a good chance of squeezing a fair few rounds off.

 

Heh, if only the game didn't give a lot of the aliens such a high resistance to Gauss damage, the Gauss Pistol would have been my favourite TFTD weapon. At the very least it has lead to a good spread of favourites.

 

If doing that, does the lower accuracy end up, once one maxes out whilst encumbered, and then taking away the sidearm, then going over the usual limit?

If not then I might just rethink my policy on the...steep learning curve.

 

Accuracy training is based on the number of hits you score during a battle. At the end of the battle, an improvement dice is rolled and this gets adjusted based on the number of times you've hit an enemy target. 11 hits has been determined to give the maximum possible dice roll range.

 

So if you're wanting to train accuracy with a slow two handed weapon, lowering your accuracy is not a good idea. With faster one-handed weapons you have to rely on the rate of fire.

 

You talk of using any weapon at point blank range after the bio drones expend their TU. Do you mean to say they are unable to selfdestruct after discharging their weapon fully?

 

No, Bio-Drones will blow up from weapons fire. I meant closing in on any alien in general to score a melee attack or just to get a point-blank shot and not have to worry about low accuracy.

 

Let's imagine a scenario. Take for example a shipping lane mission and you're fighting Lobstermen. You're roaming the interior of the ship, turn one corner and a Lobstermen is suddenly found standing half way down the new corridor you've entered. It's looking right at you. You're not wearing anything better than Plastic Aqua Armor, so a reaction shot from it now may kill you instantly. You do have a nearly full TU bar though.

 

At this point, you can get someone to scan it to see if it can react. If it can, then you can back up around the corner and try something else. If it can't react, then you choose to stand still and shoot from where you stand or safely wander up next to it and attack it at close range and not worry too much about missing at that range.

 

This can also work when fighting enemies out in the open. Basically if you're unsure if the alien can react, you can reassure yourself with a bit of intelligence gathering.

 

- NKF

[Tsathoggua]

My idea behind lowering accuracy centered upon lowering accuracy deliberately, not the core stat, just the situational accuracy as decremented by means of carrying a sidearm in the hand whilst using heavy weapons, until the stat as influenced by doing so is then maxed out. Followed by removing the sidearm in combat use until needed to draw it and pop some bug heads. Doesn't that then restore the core stat to what it would be, minus the two handed penalty? because the cause is removed, and having trained to maximum WITH two handed penalty in action, won't that then essentially push the agent's core skill over and above what they could have managed to achieve naturally?

 

TY for clarifying what you meant about the drones and weapons fire, I just wasn't quite sure if you meant they didn't explode if they had already drained their TUs to the point of being unable to fire a shot. That hinged upon weather the explosion was before (a 'weapon' in effect) or after the death flag is set by the AI.

 

Could you remind me what the tech tree requirements are for MC lab, mind-probe then the psi amp?

Err, not the requirements as such, I'm just not entirely familiar with all the infernal twistyness of the order needed to research items and what needs to be in stores at the time?

 

Edit-avoiding such nasty lobster man surprises is why I carry at least one, preferably at least two, maybe three motion scanners, that way your soldier taking point for both forward fireteams can see things coming. The TFTD motion scanner isn't anywhere near as easy to use as the UFO one was, but they come into their own for those close-quarters bloody fire fights where there is lots and lots of cover to use, but just as much cover for the enemy to pop out of , (when its least convenient, most probably). the motion scanners aren't much use in downed USO missions, given the lack of cover in many situations, unless its a large craft carrying a sizeable number of species representing a significant threat, then it does come in handy for checking what might be lurking behind that USO door an aquanaut is about to open instead of either A-blindly charging through like suicidally brainless rookie soldier intent on ending up as a taxidermy stuffed head mounted on some aquatoid commander's trophy wall or B-tossing in a dye pack, a pulse grenade and maybe spraying the place with a few HJ-C WP rounds only to find theres nothing and nobody there at all and kicking yourself for the wasted ammo.

[magic9mushroom]

My idea behind lowering accuracy centered upon lowering accuracy deliberately, not the core stat, just the situational accuracy as decremented by means of carrying a sidearm in the hand whilst using heavy weapons, until the stat as influenced by doing so is then maxed out. Followed by removing the sidearm in combat use until needed to draw it and pop some bug heads. Doesn't that then restore the core stat to what it would be, minus the two handed penalty? because the cause is removed, and having trained to maximum WITH two handed penalty in action, won't that then essentially push the agent's core skill over and above what they could have managed to achieve naturally?

No. The core stat is what is capped. The penalty is assessed when you shoot, it doesn't affect the soldier's actual Firing Accuracy stat.

 

Could you remind me what the tech tree requirements are for MC lab, mind-probe then the psi amp?

Err, not the requirements as such, I'm just not entirely familiar with all the infernal twistyness of the order needed to research items and what needs to be in stores at the time?

 

Interrogating a live terrorist unlocks M.C. Lab research (usually this happens incidentally to getting Ion Armour, since you need to interrogate a Deep One for that and it's a terrorist).

When M.C. Lab finishes researching, you must have an M.C. Reader already in stores to unlock M.C. Reader research - otherwise it's unavailable for the rest of the game (this is the research bug/trap you're vaguely remembering).

Once you've researched the M.C. Reader, interrogating a live Tasoth unlocks M.C. Disrupter research.

M.C. Disrupter research unlocks M.C. Generator research.