Let's Play X-Com: Terror from the Deep

[Nookrium]

. Another Night Terror Missions, this time we brought more grenades.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cd-u51DUDS4

[Zombie]

Nice job Neptune! See? Sonic Pulsars are the Great Equalizer™ of TFTD.

 

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but can you target a terror mission with a Barracuda or Triton to keep it on the map longer, like in EU? If this does work (looks in Neptune's direction), you can keep a terror site active indefinately as long as one of your craft is en route. Then you can do terror sites during the day instead of at night. Kinda a cheese tactic, but hey, exploit it.

 

- Zombie

[Nookrium]

can you target a terror mission with a Barracuda or Triton to keep it on the map longer, like in EU?

 

Could you use an interceptor in EU to keep it from despawning? I thought you had to use 2 skyrangers

[Veki]

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but can you target a terror mission with a Barracuda or Triton to keep it on the map longer, like in EU?

Yes, you can (at least in Collectors edition of the game).

[Space Voyager]

Where have you BEEN, Veki? Great to e-see you again.

[silencer_pl]

The Queen will deal with him.

[Zombie]

Yes, you can (at least in Collectors edition of the game).

 

Thanks Veki.

 

Could you use an interceptor in EU to keep it from despawning? I thought you had to use 2 skyrangers

 

Nope, you could use interceptors too. The only issue with the fighter aircraft is their relatively fast speed. An interceptor may only give you a few extra hours to get a landing craft to the terror site (wiki claims 1/5 the airtime of a Skyranger), but sometimes that's all you need. Most times however, another Skyranger is what's needed. I used to keep a couple around even late into the game for emergency uses or where speed isn't an issue. Prolonging a terror site was just icing.

 

There are a couple drawbacks though. The monthly 500k rental fee is quite brutal if you don't have a steady stream of income from either manufacturing or selling alien tech on the black market. The other issue is of course that it eats up a hangar space, which could be used for better craft.

 

- Zombie

[silencer_pl]

Wasn't there a trick that missions time check is checked every 30 game minutes. So you send skyranger then go to patrol then wait 25 seconds then target, then after 5 seconds you send to patrol and so on?

[Zombie]

Wasn't there a trick that missions time check is checked every 30 game minutes. So you send skyranger then go to patrol then wait 25 seconds (minutes) then target, then after 5 seconds (minutes) you send to patrol and so on?

 

I'm not sure, but since everything else is calculated on the half-hour, I would guess it would be true. Though, you have to admit it would be a lot of micro-managing craft to assure the terror site remains up until your drop ship arrives during the day. Not sure why you would want to patrol for 25 minutes and then intercept for the final 5 minutes before every half hour though (I'm assuming this is what you meant in your post). If you are micro-managing anyway, you could probably patrol until the 29th & 59th minute and then intercept the final minute until the game runs it's check that a craft is en route. That way you would maximize air-time and minimize fuel usage.

 

- Zombie

[silencer_pl]

Yeah, don't know why I switched to seconds if I said minutes in the first place :/

[Nookrium]

is now posted. The game seems to think I enjoy terror missions...

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfMyCC3KgFA

[Veki]

Where have you BEEN, Veki? Great to e-see you again.

I've been quite busy, but the project I'm working on has been completed. Hopefully I'll have more free time now.

 

I'm not sure, but since everything else is calculated on the half-hour, I would guess it would be true.

In CE terror missions dissapear on full hour, and not on every full hour. Sometimes it takes 2 or 3 hours for terror mission to dissapear.

 

is now posted. The game seems to think I enjoy terror missions...

Nice, Calcinites. You'll get melee weapons. Just in time for Lobsterman.

[silencer_pl]

So it's full hour then or full hour?

[NKF]

Just ran a test with my dos version and managed to make a very convenient save with a terror site that consistently showed up at 0:20 hours. Had some very interesting observations.

 

The terror site usually disappeared on an hourly basis. On one or two occasions the time was after the 30 minute mark, though I might've been using the 30 minute elapse for that. Later slower tests with 5s and 1m seem to have it vanish at the hour mark.

 

Another interesting observation is that the terror sites can be "live" anywhere between 3 - 10 hours. We probably already have this information squirrelled away somewhere on the ufopaedia wiki, but that was quite interesting.

 

- NKF

[Zombie]

That is interesting NKF. Could have sworn Tycho or Seb76 (or maybe zaimoni?) mentioned the 3-9 hour terror site activity time somewhere, but my search-fu is lacking today. Still not ready to call the disappearance as hourly as you had a couple times where it disappeared on the half-hour. Maybe Tycho could do a code dig and find out for us.

 

is now posted. The game seems to think I enjoy terror missions...

 

I noticed a couple things in your video I wanted to comment on. First is the Particle Disturbance Sensor. You should really be using this at the start of each turn as it'll pick up movement of your men. It'll also pick up movement of civilians too which can be very problematic in terror missions. The second is you got lucky stunning a Calcinite with the prod (not that you need a live one, the blade tech comes from a corpse). It could have turned out far worse. The thing with TFTD is that it requires so many live aliens to research. Relying on the prod is fine for some alien types if you have decent armor, but for the vast majority of aliens the Thermal Shok Launcher is the preferred method (Tasloths and Lobsterman Commanders come to mind along with the Deep One). So at some point you'll want to research that.

 

- Zombie

[NKF]

I had to run the tests a few more times. This time I ran at 5min time compression, and my terror sites were disappearing after the 30m mark. Then back to 5s/1m, and they were ending on the hour. I then alternated back and forth between 5s/1m and 5m a few times and it seems consistent.

 

I do hope radar pings aren't affected in the same way!

 

- NKF

[Nookrium]

I get a visit from some Lobstermen, and they ruin my already terrible day.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SN0HvmxLmA

[Space Voyager]

DAMN, I die all the time! Sorry for panicking and all.

 

Too bad for the mission. Both of them.

[Nookrium]

I used to think I was somewhat decent at X-Com, Terror from the Deep is informing me otherwise

[NKF]

Lobstermen do make an impression when they first show up, don't they? Work your way up to getting sonic weapons, drills or the thermal shok launcher (combined with the GC-HE to kill them once down) as soon as practicable.

 

- NKF

[Zombie]

There's a steep learning curve from UFO to TFTD, what worked fine in UFO will probably work only a little (or not at all) in TFTD. In UFO, you didn't need to be perfect to win as multiple strategies worked. In TFTD you need to be methodical and ultraprecise as any mistakes get amplified.

 

Some more points I'd like to bring up from watching your last episode... First is the Thermal Tazer. While it deals 110% stun to Lobstermen (0-176pts of stun damage) a healthy Lobsterman on beginner difficulty has 125 health. Thus you would only be able to stun a Lobsterman with one poke ~30% of the time (and much less on higher difficulty levels). The X-COM Wiki recommends the Thermal Tazer as a viable option against this alien, but I don't really consider it a safe choice - more like a last resort (see next paragraph). If I had to face Lobstermen with Thermal Tazers, I'd attempt to bum-rush the alien with as many men with tazers as possible always approaching from the back side to avoid sympathetic reaction fire. This isn't foolproof and I'd still expect casualties, especially against multiple aliens.

 

Now, with the melee drills (Vibroblade, Thermic Lance & Heavy Thermic Lance) the story is different as Lobstermen take double damage from them. The Vibroblade (with the same amount of "damage" as the Thermal Tazer) deals 0-320pts of damage - enough to kill a Beginner level Lobsterman over 60% of the time with just one poke. That doubles your odds of surviving against this alien. The biggest upside of using the Vibroblade vs the Thermal Tazer is it's TU cost: (10% for the Vibroblade, 40% for the Thermal Tazer). That means you can poke a Lobsterman 3 more times than the tazer for the same TU cost. When your soldiers are a constant group of rookies, they can only use 20% of their TU for movement to get into range for 2 pokes of the tazer. Since rookies have 50-60 TU starting stats, that means they only have 10-12 TU to move which equates 2-3 tiles at 4 TU cost. See a problem here? This is why I don't recommend the Thermal Tazers as you would get 3 times the bang with using the lowly Vibroblade. Not only that, but stunned Lobstermen are still deadly as they have inherent melee capabilities. Blowing them up with explosives as NKF mentions is the best way to protect against this.

 

Sonic Pulsers are still the best against Lobstermen. As you found out, these grenades can be dumped one on top of another and they all will explode without destroying the others. (At one time I thought this was a bug, but looking at OBDATA.DAT {the file that holds object information} it seems intentional as the devs gave all the grenade types very high tolerances vs explosions). In fact, you can intermix the grenade types without worry of accidental destruction. Do you see why the Sonic Pulser is the Great Equalizer™ in TFTD now?

 

There is another thing I'd like to mention (which I touched upon in my previous post) and that is the Thermal Shok launcher. It deals 110% damage to Lobstermen just like the Thermal Tazer, but it is much better against them for four reasons.

1. It is AOE and can affect multiple aliens instead of only one.
   
2. You can attack at a distance.
   
3. It deals more stun damage.
   
4. It doesn't require much research effort to obtain.
   

One strategy I don't see you using much is the "dump and run" strategy. It involves a spotter and a support crew of about 2-4 soldiers. The spotter "spots" the aliens, and the crew (who are following behind by about 5-6 tiles) dump their loads on the alien (pardon the pun). After that, the spotter pulls back (or hides behind an object) so the alien can't see him/her anymore. Rinse and repeat until the alien is dead. You just need to be careful that the area behind and to either side of the crew are clear as you don't want to draw grenade attacks from aliens.

 

By the way, in your last mission against the Lobsterman "Escort" ship, I see your alien vessel was unpatched (the game swaps the escort and survey ship by accident). Check out my patch which fixes this issue and also the unconnected spawn points in the true survey ship.

 

- Zombie

[Space Voyager]

Just so that you don't make a grave mistake, I'm posting a vid that specifies how exactly to deal with a terror mission when you find out that terrorizing is done by Lobstermen. It has been posted before, but it does not hurt to go over the basics again.

 

https://youtu.be/WziO005uM3g

[Nookrium]

Just so that you don't make a grave mistake, I'm posting a vid that specifies how exactly to deal with a terror mission when you find out that terrorizing is done by Lobstermen. It has been posted before, but it does not hurt to go over the basics again.

 

https://youtu.be/WziO005uM3g

 

HAHAHAHAHA!! That was amazing

 

 

Thanks for the tips btw, I'll take everything I can get

[silencer_pl]

I think I've posted this some time ago, so I applaud to SV's memory (or maybe it wasn't me but it was surely put here on this forums).

I have found some time to watch this LP. That is a strange base placement. You cover most of your sonar range with land mass? Why? Also I see you rely mostly on auto shots. While technically it was discussed that 3x autoshot is way better than 1x snapshot, I personally found more successful results using snap shots / aimed shots if possible. Auto shots in close proximity only.

[Nookrium]

I think I've posted this some time ago, so I applaud to SV's memory (or maybe it wasn't me but it was surely put here on this forums).

I have found some time to watch this LP. That is a strange base placement. You cover most of your sonar range with land mass? Why? Also I see you rely mostly on auto shots. While technically it was discussed that 3x autoshot is way better than 1x snapshot, I personally found more successful results using snap shots / aimed shots if possible. Auto shots in close proximity only.

 

I made the mistake of reading an online strategy guide somewhere that I now have realized didn't do me much good at all. My base could be a bit better placed and I think I should have skipped Gauss altogether and just gone into Sonic as soon as I could.

I've always used auto, I don't really even think about it much. With my lousy weapons it never seems to me that a single shot will help much. I just finished recording the next episode a bit ago and (with Sonic Rifles) I used aimed shot a bit more and it seemed to work out better. Using a different solo scout with careful group behind tactic (as Zombie recommended), the aimed shot / duck and cover seemed to work out pretty well.

My previous UFO strategies aren't doing me much good so hopefully I can adapt and survive TftD a bit longer