Let's Play UFO:Extraterrestrials Gold

[Thorondor]

Maybe it's just me, Zombie, but Sky Diver is not exactly a very heartening christening for a troop transport ship that's supposed to safely land to offload its precious human operatives, is it?

 

Now, Nightwolf I'm on board with. With a pack of those on the prowl we should see an increase in UFO takedowns that could well go a ways towards sweetening our funding figures come evaluation time next month, if they live up to the name.

 

Don't know how much of a return on your investment you'll get for selling off some Exterminators but that should ease some of the pain to at least give the swap a go on the best placed bases (those covering several territories).

 

New personal armour and new interceptors on the launch pad and it's all systems go!

[Zombie]

My squad of Exterminators from the satellite bases were able to down a Battleship the other day. One of them was a tad damaged by the encounter but at least I didn't lose it. In goes my team with their brand new transport:

 

 

It's not as wide as the Lightning transport which is nice as you have a giant blind spot at the front of the ship. This mission was stupid chasers and larva - not a lot of xp to be had and very little strategy too: run and gun. Chasers don't have a commander rank either so you can indiscriminately kill everything that moves. EOM report:

 

 

Billi and Melia did most of the killing as they were the lowest xp soldiers I had along but once they caught up some other soldiers got in on the action inside the UFO. That $500k+ bounty is a nice addition as I need the cash because of:

 

 

I built a couple for my main base first to see how they perform in combat. We didn't have to wait long as a scout came buzzing around. Needless to say it was no match for the two Nightwolfs. And it crashed right next to my base so it would be rude not to go visit. More chasers and larva which seems to be the common theme as of late. Maybe the aliens are sick of losing their good units and send in the crap instead.

 

I switched my squad around again to make sure the lowest xp are on the transport and disembark first. Kathlene started out with 3 kills. While looking at the map I noticed there was a building nearby with a lift so I shot a hole in the wall and sent in OVNI with his scanner upstairs. Just like I thought, there was a larva who was floating around in the air at the other side of the building he was in. When OVNI got over there he sat tight and waited till it looked like the larva was close, then shot a hole in the wall to gain LOS and killed it with an auto shot. I figured I should probably send someone else upstairs with him in case he needs to be healed so I sent Melia up there in the room next to his. Next round another larva was floating around the area where OVNI was. Same as before, he widened the hole in the wall to gain LOS then killed the larva with an auto shot. Having the high ground is so important!

 

With all the larva killed the last two chasers who were camped out inside the UFO made a beeline to my troops. OVNI took one out with a reaction shot but the second chaser shot him for 1 damage. After Phobos killed the chaser, OVNI shoots a hole in the wall to the other room where Melia was stationed to get healed. Unfortunately there were some furniture items which could not be destroyed in the way so the mission had to end. Didn't matter because he didn't need the hospital - he's a tough guy. EOM:

 

 

So Galfar was promoted for doing nothing. Now, I have been keeping a close eye on my soldier's xp during a mission so I knew what most were at. When I get back to base though their xp is a little bit higher. So I think what's happening is that everyone along on a mission is awarded some token xp at the end just for being there. That makes sense. So let's allocate some points to Galfar:

 

 

The usual strategy here: put 3 points into strength to max that out and then I put one in bravery and the last in throwing. Galfar isn't wearing the new Waspkeeper armor as he is a backline trooper so I didn't think it was necessary. Well, look at OVNI he's the supposed to be the same but still gets into the action (and trouble) so maybe they need the better armor too. That'll teach me.

 

After returning I started swaping out Exterminators for Nightwolfs at Pulsar until that base was converted to the new interceptors. Started on Seathopia too as that satellite base is a little farther away and I figure the speed increase of the Nightwolf will allow the interceptors there to help out. Before the first Nightwolf was transfered a special research project finished:

 

 

I put 25 scientists on both the Chem grenade III and the Stun Grenade II. Really I should have put the whole team on the Chem grenade III as I know I'd be using that immediately. A new and more powerful stun grenade is good too, but I think I have enough captured Vipon Commanders now so it's not a must-have item. Anyway, that's where I left off last night.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

Lieutenant Galfar has a nice ring to it. Climbing up the ladder while chilling out and looking good with his shades - that's the way you do it, let me tell you that guy ain't dumb, Zombie.

 

And speaking of peace of mind, do queue up more Waspkeeper armor as you don't know what they're about to spring on you after lulling you into a false sense of security with those pushover alien contingents of late.

 

Another thing you may wish not to sidetrack is that Chemical Rocket Mark II. In the meantime: Gooooo Nightwolfs!!

[Zombie]

Another thing you may wish not to sidetrack is that Chemical Rocket Mark II. In the meantime:

 

Meh, I just don't use the rocket launcher. This is partially a holdover from UFO Defense where I intentionally didn't use explosives to prevent from blowing up my hard earned loot, and partially because I have grenades which can be thrown over objects to hit the target. I'll be researching it eventually especially since I have 50 scientists itching for something to do.

 

Speaking of grenades and research, take a look at these bad boys:

 

 

I should have really stopped production on the Nightwolfs and Waspkeeper armor in order to manufacture a bunch of them for my soldiers to use, but the mark II chem grenades have been fine. A battlecruiser showed up so it was shot down and my team visited it. Chasers and larva again so it wasn't hard.

 

 

As before, not a lot of xp to go around for my soldiers but it provided some good cash to offset some of the costs of building those new interceptors. I was still in the process of manufacturing a Nightwolf when a UFO swarm appeared. The aliens made a huge mistake by spawning a lone red scout near my base in Seathopia while the remainder of the fleet was clear across the continent. It was shot down easily and drew some of the other UFOs closer to land. My Exterminators in Thermos were able to down one of the battlecruisers over land and a red fighter too. Meanwhile in Patria, my interceptors there took out another battlecruiser and a scout. The flagship battleship of the swarm was messing around in the southern hemisphere so I took a chance and sent in my troops to take care of that battlecruiser in Thermos. Vipons and larva and I even captured a commander too.

 

 

Billi was wounded by standing in a chem gas cloud from a Larva. She was patched up before the mission ended so she was thankfully ok. The swarm battleship then started flying northerly so I sent out everything within range to converge on it. My Nightwolfs from Pulsar never actually made it into the fight as my Exterminators had polished it off already (one took a little damage).

 

 

That was a fantastic reward of $4.5 million as I've been hurting for cash lately. But the reward for taking out the battleship on the ground is too good to pass up. As soon as my troops got back to base I quickly gave them the new chem grenade mark III's and and the second gen stun grenade. OVNI and Galfar got Waspkeeper armor and everyone was reordered so the lowest xp soldiers leave the transport first. Had just enough gas to get to the battleship so my next post will be that mission.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

A swarm no more 'cause Commander Zombie is hardcore!

 

Time to loosen those purse strings fools as that crash site is about to get the regal treatment. 'Nuff said.

 

[Zombie]

So my team zones in and literally the entire map was red with aliens. This screenshot was taken in round 2 to hopefully show more distinct blips:

 

 

I've never seen this many aliens on a map before and I almost chickened out to go back to base and add more ammo and grenades. In the end I just toughed it out and tried to make every shot count. Initially the mission was going good: a bunch of my soldiers had a kill or two (Preachers and Trilobites were the aliens present). The Trilobites took a ton of shots to kill but those new mark 3 chem grenades really put the hurt on the preachers.

 

Must've been round 50 or so when the aliens stopped coming near me. But there were two small units (aka preachers) camped out at the nose of the transport. I've mentioned this before, but if you ever run across camped out alien units near your ship it's almost certainly alien commanders. I caught a glimpse of one of them and got the greenish hue around the alien spotted icon so I tossed a couple second gen stun grenades in their direction. One fell stunned, the other one I had to toss a weaker chem grenade on to knock out. After a bunch of turns when my team eventually disembarked and started sweeping the map this is what the commanders looked like:

 

 

While sweeping around one side of the UFO, one of my soldiers spotted a trilobite floating around in the air. Before we could get into position to shoot at it, it disappeared. My soldier again went investigating (solo, big mistake) and ran out of time units trying to withdraw. This is that he saw next round:

 

 

Darn lucky. Not only that, but neither unit had any TU left to reaction shoot so my guy was able to get to a safe location while another soldier tossed a chem grenade between them killing both. When we gained entry to the UFO, part of my team plugged the lift to the central area upstairs while the rest went to plug the lift to the bridge. Melia went above next round and saw three preachers in a group in the bridge so she tossed another chem grenade on them. Easiest bridge cleanup ever. The last preacher was dispatched quickly and this was the EOM report:

 

 

A bunch more xp for my soldiers, two preacher commanders captured and nearly a cool $1 million bounty. That's a successful mission. Back to the Geoscape and more good news:

 

 

So yeah, the cash, but also another alien life scanner and another personal eternal shield (these are great because you only need to carry this for all your shielding and it weighs significantly less than separate shield units).

 

Didn't take too long but another research project finished:

 

 

I haven't produced any of these babies yet as my engineers are still busy with the Nightwolfs and chem grenades, but these could be handy for my guys with the life scanners as i will not have to rely on lifts to get to different levels now. Cool stuff!

 

- Zombie

[Space Voyager]

Seriously, a map filled with aliens and not even a wounded soldier?! I'm starting to feel bad for the aliens... They suck at invasions!

[Thorondor]

What a preamble, Zombie - you had me a tad worried at 'Initially the mission was going good'. Then they got wrecked and it was raining money!

 

I mean it can't be denied Galfar really had Lady Luck on his side there and it's a good idea not to test her fickleness like that again anytime soon.

 

That said, confidence levels are through the roof right now, so why not roll the dice on a fresh batch of those Personal Anti-Grav Systems for our operatives and see just how "Intense" the ride is.

[Zombie]

Seriously, a map filled with aliens and not even a wounded soldier?! I'm starting to feel bad for the aliens... They suck at invasions!

 

I got really, really, lucky with that face-to-face Trilobite and Preacher encounter. That could have turned out to be curtains for that soldier.

 

I mean it can't be denied Galfar really had Lady Luck on his side there and it's a good idea not to test her fickleness like that again anytime soon.

 

It wasn't Galfar though, I just had his profile active when the screenshot was taken. Look for the blue icon on the mini map, that's Galfar and he's a fair distance away from the two aliens. I don't remember who the soldier was that got too close (maybe Lashunda).

 

So it was quiet on the globe for a little bit, but that didn't last long.I shot down 2 scouts and a cruiser in quick succession. After shooting down the first scout I immediately sent my transport there (Patria) to get a jump on the festivities.

 

 

It was a fairly difficult mission with Phantoms and Inquisitors so I was glad I brought along some extra mark III chem grenades. Once you whittle down the numbers it becomes easier. EOM Report:

 

 

More spreading the xp around so no promotions. When my squad got back to base it was a partial switchout to lower xp soldiers and then it was right back out there to get to that cruiser in Meade. This time it was Observers and Vipons. Kind of an odd couple if you ask me. What was strange is the Observers all came to my transport and were picked off by my camped out soldiers. When they were all taken care of the Vipons started their scouting routes and I began picking them off one-by-one.

 

Pretty soon none of the Vipons wanted to move anymore. There was one that was camped out a couple screens over from my transport so I assumed (correctly) that it was a commander. I sent a group of 3 soldiers over there and whoever had the best accuracy tossed the stun grenade on it. Then everyone went to the UFO.

 

There were actually 4 inside: two on the ground level (1 in the middle lift room and 1 in the engine room) and 2 upstairs on the bridge. The Vipon in the lift room was killed easily, then I sent 4 soldiers upstairs to take care of the two Vipons and also to plug the lift. That went great. One issue I found is that aliens can actually successfully shoot up the lift. So maybe the best idea is to proxy mine the lift room to make sure the last alien can never even make it to the lift to try shooting up. So Duane was shot by the Vipon, but his reactions were good so he was able to kill it ending the mission:

 

 

He'll be in the hospital for a couple days which is unfortunate as he's getting close to 1800 xp. Most of my soldiers have just cracked 1800 xp so there's going to be some mass promotions coming up in a mission or two. My research into the Phantom just finished:

 

 

I'm about halfway finished with the particle pistol right now. No reason to switch to that as the AKEW and EEEW rifles are doing a good job. I'll be switching to the particle rifle though. Oh, and here's the UFOPaedia entry for the Phantom:

 

 

Kinda sinister looking and resistant to mechanical damage so it's good I have inferno grenades and mark III chem grenades too.

 

Next time it's going to be some more missions as I shot down a fighter a couple scouts and a battleship. It's never-ending.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

The Rock got clipped by a frisky Vipon? It should've known better than to mess with the man.

 

There's no time to bleed in this war, so hopefully he'll be back on your active roster in no time, Zombie.

 

There's no question the Phantom is this game's Ethereal and it seems they just need to have the heat turned up some more to go crispy as we like it. Maybe with the help of some particle heaters?

[Zombie]

Here's what the globe presently looks like:

 

 

All of those UFOs I shot down are really close to my base which means if I play my cards right I can visit everything and get some xp for my soldiers. I started with the fighter as it was the first one I shot down, then I went to the two scouts:

 

 

Not a heck of a lot of xp to get as most of the aliens were chasers or vipons and larva, but I did my best to spread the wealth a bit. Just before I visited the last scout the particle pistol finished researching.

 

 

Not going to produce this, it's just a means to an end (aka particle rifle). Besides, I'm trying to get some of those anti-grav units produced for my soldiers so that takes precedence. See, those anti-grav units reduce the weight a soldier carries by 25% which is quite significant. Some of my soldiers who are carrying the chemogun can only fit 5 shield units in their backpack so they are a little low on protection. Right now only OVNI and Galfar have them as those two have the alien life scanners which kinda go hand-in-hand. Back at base finally and it was a hello and goodbye type of thing: get some lower xp soldiers on the transport, grab some more mark III chem grenades and inferno grenades and head out to that battleship. (The reason for the chem grenades is that they are effective against chasers and the inferno grenades are good against larva). We of course spawn in to a hot LZ with two larva and a chaser kinda bunched up together - a perfect choice for an inferno grenade. Take a look at the box in the upper right:

 

 

Lash killed both larva with critical hits but only scratched the chaser which shot back. Elmo finished it off though. After this it was a waiting game to see who was going to move first. A larva floating on L2 kinda got by our scanners as I only have them deployed on L0 and L1, but it was easily killed. I might start bringing 3 alien life scanners along on battleship missions to make sure aliens aren't getting around the scans on the first two levels. Anyhow, the rest of the mission was a cake walk.

 

 

Most of my soldiers are now in the 1850+xp range (the only exceptions are Owl:1838, Duane:1843 and Phobos:1848). Everyone back at base is 1860+ so they are on the cusp of a promotion. Hopefully we have a mission or two with higher xp aliens as I want to get everyone to Lieutenant ASAP.

 

- Zombie

[Zombie]

Just in the nick of time we have the particle rifle, long awaited and it's finally here!

 

 

Gotta love that huge 30 round clip size. They take a long time to produce and are pretty expensive so I'm doing a slow rollout. I've got a number of other things to produce right now so I have to pick and choose. The reason for this is my research team has been very efficient and are cranking out the topics faster than I can do a complete switchover. Case in point:

 

 

One topic completed in less than a day and these aren't your run-of-the-mill topics either, they are advanced things that should require more time to figure out. Not complaining obviously. The particle cannon (according to the strategy guide) is slow to fire but is more accurate and in the end is less efficient to use than ion or akew cannons. So I'm sticking to those instead of switching over. The Imperator ship missile though is top notch. I'm finding these much too powerful for the small fry as I think they outright destroy the small ufos completely (I need to test this more vigorously though). They are great against battlecruisers/battleships.

 

I went down the particle defense path because that leads to the particle ship shield which is always better than previous shields. Those are slow to roll out too as they are expensive and take a long time to produce. The one thing I did fast track is the particle shield for soldiers. They don't take too long to manufacture and the cost isn't exorbitant either.

 

After all this research the aliens started poking around in my area again. It looked like a cruiser was doing espionage and a battleship was retaliation. Both were shot down. For the first course, my team went to the cruiser. I was completely expecting more of the usual I've been seeing: chasers/vipons and larva. Wrong. This time it was phantoms and inquisitors. Finally some decent xp! One drawback to higher xp aliens (besides difficulty) is you have to be careful who you kill with your soldiers if you are training them up. 30xp for a kill starts to add up fast: soldiers at 1850 xp require about 5-6 chaser/vipon/larva kills to get to 1880xp while it takes just one kill with an inquisitor or phantom. So it was a lot of killing an alien, dropping the particle rifle on the ground, picking up another soldier's weapon and having that soldier pick up the particle rifle to start the whole process over the next round.

 

There were 10 soldiers on this mission who needed just one kill to get to lieutenant the last two were my "anchors": OVNI and Galfar. Until we got to the UFO I wasn't sure there would be enough aliens to accomplish this, but there were two phantoms upstairs and two downstairs. As usual I sent in 4 soldiers upstairs to kill the two phantoms and plug the lift. Meanwhile, downstairs I was "flooding" the lift room with incendiary and chem gas grenades. The last two phantoms came out of hiding and this is what I saw:

 

 

I think these two found the only safe spot on that side of the room to stand. One was a commander too. We all know what is going to happen next:

 

 

So that was the end of the mission. Very successful, no injuries and we captured a commander too (although I have so many vipon commanders in alien containment that we'll never get to research the phantoms. The EOM report was telling:

 

 

With 10 promotions I'll skip the commentary and just show the results:

 

 

For those soldiers who still needed points to max out strength I allocated as much as I could there, then put the rest in agility, vitality and bravery (and maybe throwing if there was extra). For everyone else it was one point into agility, vitlity, bravery, reactions and throwing. Easy stuff.

 

The next mission I do is going to be that battleship. I have 9 more soldiers at base who are close to a promotion and also a brand new rookie who hasn't seen combat yet. I was hoping for an alien base mission but maybe I'll bring him along for some training.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

That promotion awarding ceremony can only lead to a memorable 15-minute stretch of shenanigans, Zombie - one where everyone greets everyone else grinning with "Congrats, Lieutenant", "Looking good Lieutenant", "Don't forget the little guys Lieutenant"...

 

Absolutely lovely progress on the research front though and I especially like the sound of the new ship rocket. Here's an Imperator just for you!

 

Agree with you on getting the particle shielding tech fielded ASAP. And now that we're all well acquainted with the chem and stun varieties I wouldn't mind seeing what an antimatter grenade is capable of (I know, damage is bad for our pockets but do use it outside on a tough xeno just to see the numbers on hit).

 

What's this I hear; a greenhorn has been hired? The poor fellow is going to spend his whole day saluting all these officers left and right just to get to his place at the back of the transport.

[Zombie]

Agree with you on getting the particle shielding tech fielded ASAP. And now that we're all well acquainted with the chem and stun varieties I wouldn't mind seeing what an antimatter grenade is capable of (I know, damage is bad for our pockets but do use it outside on a tough xeno just to see the numbers on hit).

 

Will do, that research project is currently underway and about 60% complete so it shouldn't be too long.

 

What's this I hear; a greenhorn has been hired? The poor fellow is going to spend his whole day saluting all these officers left and right just to get to his place at the back of the transport.

 

Introducing Mephistoex:

 

 

That's about the best I could find after who knows how long. His shooting and strength are both 55 which is great as he'll start out better than average. He got the 3rd anti-grav unit I produced so he'd be able to carry a little bit more but he couldn't put on the waspkeeper armor without suffering encumbrance penalties so beekeeper it is. That'll come back to haunt me later on though.

 

That crashed battleship was patiently waiting so I sent out the troops to check it out. This was a "new" group of 6 soldiers who haven't achieved the Lieutenant rank yet, but were really close (~1850+xp-ish range). Plus the usual OVNI and Galfar and three extra lower xp Lieutenants to round out the list and to act as mules. Got really lucky (if you can call it that) as the aliens were Phantoms and Inquisitors. So enough xp for each kill to level up those 6 soldiers and the rest for Mephistoex (if all goes well).

 

It started out easy enough as 5/6 soldiers all got plenty xp from one kill to get their promotion. Scottie was the last one left and I intentionally didn't take any shots at aliens to make sure Mephistoex had ample opportunity. Scottie was kneeling next to him to act as backup in case it was necessary. Galfar was using his alien life scanner on L1 next to the transport and realized that he hasn't checked L2 for alien activity. Turns out there was an Inquisitor lurking nearby on that level so everyone fell back except for Scottie and Meph.

 

Well, the Inquisitor took a few shots at them and Meph took some fire damage due to his weakish armor and so did Scottie (he was kneeling in the flames during the aliens turn). After killing the Inquisitor, Mephi and Scottie had to both withdraw out of the flames to get healed. After the flames died down the team was right at it again though I did have to transfer some shields around from the team to fill in Scottie & Mephi's depleted units. Inside the UFO killing went superb. Mephi was able to either shoot or toss grenades to whittle down the enemy numbers. There was even two Phantom Commanders which he was able to stun. And Scottie finally got the kill he needed. EOM report:

 

 

Here's how I allocated the points for the 6 Lieutenant promotions:

 

 

Mephistoex went from rookie to Staff Sergeant which meant 35 points to spend:

 

 

He would need 11 points in both shooting and strength to max those stats out so I backed those down to an even 10. Then it was 5 points in bravery to get him to 70+ which meant there was 10 points left to go into agility, vitality, reactions and throwing.

 

Now that he has 95 strength, he'll be able to wear the waspkeeper armor. And he's behind the ball when it comes to promotions so you can bet we'll be seeing more of him in the future. After this though, I cannot hire any more soldiers as the limit has been reached. Doesn't matter really as my squad is excellent. Even if my base gets infiltrated while my transport is out, I still have a great team to take the aliens out. Now I need to manufacture some more armor for them and guns and shields and ammo and anti-grav units and... the list goes on and on.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

"Mephistoex dropping in hot!"

 

Can't even be raked over the coals as he was just following orders from you, Zombie.

 

Well, he took it like a man, dished out some punishment of his own and lived to tell the heroic story of his very first mission.

 

Then everybody else became a Lieutenant and his difficulty in recognizing the different rank chevrons became a thing of the past as he simply couldn't mistakenly address anyone as "Sarge" anymore, having become one himself at that.

 

Gear up already - we're taking the fight to them bugs again!!

[Zombie]

First of all, I might make this a double header as I played so much and didn't have a chance to post anything. My scientists completed their research into that antimatter grenade. It kinda puts everything else to shame:

 

 

It's a cool purple color but the selling feature is the damage by far. I produced a couple dozen of them and equipped my troops with one each. I suggest the rookies get more of these (if they have the strength to carry more) or give some to your "mules" to carry around for the rookies to use. Even a mis-throw will probably be a kill shot. Shot down a scout UFO and got the PERFECT opportunity to test out an antimatter grenade with two chasers away from each other by one tile:

 

 

Mephistoex was at the very edge of the blast but suffered no damage (a damage roll never even happened so it's possible there wasn't any power left at that distance). But it was all Mephistoex for this mission as he killed everythiing (crap XP though, this is a recurring theme):

 

 

I started selling off a lot of the UFO parts or weapons I've accumulated through all these missions as they aren't needed anymore due to research or being archaic. I've given up on plasma weaponry for months but the aliens are still carrying them. Might as well hold a fire sale at the end of each month to keep the bank balance healthy. Speaking of the end of month, the report is in and it's... Excellent!

 

 

Everyone is back up to full funding now except for Syrtis Maior which is still on iffy terms with me for some reason. I need a battleship to land there to bring it back fully (or a new human base) as my interceptors never head that far South, or if they do they shoot the UFO down over water. I did notice my detectors are giving me a lot more info about UFOs now - including a "Tech Level" which I know nothing about:

 

 

I'm hoping that as my research progresses that it will open up that info. Anyway a battleship was flying around so I shot it down over water. One of my Nightwolf interceptors narrowly avoided being destroyed as it only had 4 points of health left when it limped back to base. Guess that'll be out of commission for a while until it's repaired. (Not technically true as you can send out damaged interceptors, but why would you want to risk it)?

 

Shot down another cruiser directly after this and sent in the same squad as before. Doesn't really matter who is on the transport as Mephistoex is doing all of the killing:

 

 

Destroyers and Larva. Kind of a strange pairing but this combo is difficult as both units are 1x1 aliens so you don't know what's what from the blips on the alien life scanner. I've been peeking out of the transport every turn just to make sure larva aren't sneaking in on L1 unannounced. It's funny how Larva behind the transport on L1 will "see" a soldier inside and then try to shoot it's chem gas in there but it never hits. Little bit of a glitch or bug I guess.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

It just struck me, on the subject of that "State Rating" business on the monthly reports, that there are states with a rating of Good paying as much as some with Excellent and the Very Good one matching others which are rated Good and Excellent.

 

Such discrepancies seem hard to explain though I imagine funding must be tied to territory size and that may be the ruling factor.

 

Well, the overall monthly score is where it needs to be, so no lazing about, Mephistoex - there's more meat to be put into the grinder!

[Zombie]

It just struck me, on the subject of that "State Rating" business on the monthly reports, that there are states with a rating of Good paying as much as some with Excellent and the Very Good one matching others which are rated Good and Excellent.

 

Such discrepancies seem hard to explain though I imagine funding must be tied to territory size and that may be the ruling factor.

 

It's dead easy to explain Mr T. The overall funding cap of a state normally (without a human base in it) is $487,499. This funding level is then further modified (up or down) by alien and human activity in the state. Once you reach the cap it doesn't matter how much positive activity a player does in a state, you're stuck there. The only way to increase this cap is to build a base in the state which bumps the level up to $780,000. Not sure how the devs arrived at these numbers but it is what it is.

 

On to part 2 of the double header. My interceptors shot down a cruiser and when the team zones in it was a hospital map. Most of the aliens were killed (larva and destroyers again) so my team had to make the long trek to the UFO to kill the last three who were camped. Just before we got there we stopped by some park benches to regroup. Notice anything strange in this pic?

 

 

The park benches seem to be the correct size for humans (maybe a tad too deep but otherwise normal) but what about the ambulance? It looks like a large toy car! Anyhow, Mephistoex was a killing machine again:

 

 

Back at base a significant piece of research finished:

 

 

All those items (except for the advanced workshop) are things you need to research to open up the final ship design. I'll go into that more maybe next time, but the thing I'm after is the advanced workshop. I already have the advanced laboratory which has been a big help so far but I need more "oomph" with manufacturing presently. There are a lot of things I'm trying to complete but there are also other things which finish that I need too and there isn't enough engineers to do it all in a reasonable amount of time. So I completed work on that.

 

The nice thing about the advanced workshop and lab is that it is a more efficient design: the old types are a 1x1 block which hold 10 people but the advanced variants are 1x2 blocks which hold 30 people. The big drawbacks are that they are expensive and are tricky to fit into an already clogged main base. My main base is completely filled so trying to shoehorn a 1x2 block in there means something's gotta go. I thought this through for a little and came up with a plan that's doable:

 

 

I'm honestly not sure if I need both a Hospital and a Surgery center as the nomenclature isn't exactly clear so I assumed they both are and kept them. In the upper right corner of the old base I had a normal workshop and laboratory. For this I removed both of them and plunked down the Surgery (hopefully I don't need it right away as I removed the other module) and the Alien Containment (kept the old module as I didn't know what would happen if you removed it completely). That removed one building from below in the base. The second was a rocket defense which wasn't helping the cause any. Doing that opened up a 1x2 area to place the advanced workshop under the advanced lab. Great!

 

The only drawback is that I'll be running on only 10 engineers for the next 25 days and that could be a major problem if something comes up. In terms of interceptors, at Thermos, Seathopia and Pulsar I have 5 Nightwolfs at each base fitted with particle shields, imperator missiles and akew cannons. The only base I didn't get to is Patria which still has 5 Exterminator interceptors each with EEEW shields, long lance missiles and akew cannons. It isn't bad, but I'm not sending this group out solo against a battleship. The big issue is consumables though. So I had to do a little manufacturing to beef up my stockpiles of mark III chem grenades, antimatter grenades, personal particle shields and particle rifle ammo. I think I should be set on those for a while. In the meantime, I have my 10 engineers slowly plugging away at manufacturing 5 particle shields for my interceptors at Patria, and then after that imperator missile launchers. Hopefully this rambling makes some sense.

 

Shot down another cruiser back in the Geoscape so in go the troops. This time it was larva and vipons. When we cleared out all of the larva and most of the vipons there seemed to be a vipon camped outside somewhere so I assumed it was a commander and sent my stunning team over there. All it took was a single stun grenade and it went down quietly. Just for giggles, I sent OVNI over to check out what the commander carries. This is what I saw:

 

 

They basically carry a double kit a normal vipon carries. Seems like this may be a bug in the code as there really isn't a need to carry two plamsa rifles at the same time. Meh, whatever, it means I have more to sell. Mephistoex was a stunning/killing machine as always and took top honors in the EOM report:

 

 

About time he got promoted to warrant officer! Well, let's allocate those 5 points:

 

 

Kinda an easy choice: 1 point into Strength and Shooting to max those stats out, then one point into agility, vitality and bravery. Not bad - he turned out to be a good recruit overall. Granted, I gave him plenty of chances to gain as much xp as he could on each mission, even when there wasn't much to be had. Now I have to get him to lieutenant so he can skip the saluting stuff all together.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

Thanks for the explanation, Zombie. I suppose that's that and arbitrary developer logic it is.

 

You're right about the ambulance proportions. There's definitely something fishy going on there. Its design kind of reminds me of the Ecto-1 from Ghostbusters too.

 

Current proceedings with regards to manufacturing well understood. It has been apparent from day one that shifting and replacing facilities within bases is far from a streamlined process. At least you've gotten past the issues with crashing once reported.

 

Mephistoex: promoted and buffed up. Just look at that jolly face - he's raring to go get some by golly!

[Zombie]

Totally forgot it was the end of the month so let's see what the states think of my job protecting them:

 

 

Syrtis Maior finally started to pull their weight again, right now they are 30k away from the funding cap. Hopefully we can keep this up. Not long after this though was my first test of the month:

 

 

So yeah, the general strategy is to try and pick off the scouts, fighters and cruisers first then dash back to base before the battleships can hunt down your interceptors. After that go after the swarm leader and when it's down you can try to go after the last battleship.

 

 

One of my interceptors got heavily damaged again and another was seriously damaged but luckily they were able to limp back to base in one piece. Time to send in the troops. Now I'd suggest NOT attempting to run a ground mission with the swarm leader while the last battleship is still flying around free. Ideally everything should be shot down so that you have air superiority and be able to send out the transport to any site without worry. I broke this rule and almost paid the price.

 

If my memory serves me, this mission was all preachers. One of the first turns a preacher commander paid a visit so we stunned it right next to the transport. Nice to get rid of them early as they can wreak havoc with their high TU and reactions. Mostly we waited in/near the transport for 50-60 rounds until we whittled the aliens down to a group that didn't move anymore. The first alien we met inside the UFO was another commander. It was met with a couple stun grenades until it was knocked out. The rest was easy: plug the lift to the main part of the UFO and get rid of the stuff on the bridge. When those are gone, finish off whatever still moves. In the end there were a lot of aliens to deal with:

 

 

I was kinda spreading the wealth around so to speak, I wanted everyone to get close to 2000 xp. Mephistoex is still short of 1880 xp for the next promotion. Back on the Geoscape and let's see what's the reward:

 

 

I don't really need another alien life scanner, but I definitely want the two personal eternal shields and the advanced ship parts. In this pic, my transport is starting to head home from Seathopia and my interceptors are trying to distract the last battleship but it had one thing on it's mind: base retaliation. Couldn't get enough firepower on it to take it down and since I don't have a base defense module anymore the battleship had an open door.

 

 

There were 7 soldiers stationed at my main base and a tank. Really you only need 6 soldiers for this but the last soldier can use the alien life scanner and open doors. Luckily it was only vipons and larva so they went down in a hurry. Not much xp but I don't care - we defended the base and that's all that matters. EOM report:

 

 

Only two of my soldiers have sub 2000 xp right now. Owl is at 1964 which isn't too far off and then Mephistoex has 1290. We are getting there. In terms of research, I'm finishing off some projects which have no bearing on the outcome of the game and then I'll start on the end-game stuff. I just don't want to trigger anything until I have my main base facilities built and swap out the last few interceptors to nighthawks

- Zombie

[Space Voyager]

This game is more or less decided, right? You're making tons of dough, not losing a soldier, not even wounded... Is there room for a surprise, like no. 1 had - swarms etc?

[Zombie]

This game is more or less decided, right?

 

Probably? I don't know exactly as I'm pretty sure I never finished this game before. Judging by the short list of research topics left it's going to take a couple months in-game time to get that done and maybe another to manufacture everything. Just a guess though.

 

You're making tons of dough, not losing a soldier, not even wounded...

 

I have a healthy amount of money but these nightwolf interceptors and advanced weaponry and shields use a lot of that up. I've been supplementing my income with fire sales of alien equipment to make sure I have enough on hand. Plus I can add a few more bases eventually and that's expensive too. As for soldiers, they cannot be killed if you are careful and most can be patched up on a mission to minimize the time they are in the hospital.

 

Is there room for a surprise, like no. 1 had - swarms etc?

 

Try to keep up man, this is the first game - and I just completed a swarm mission in my last post. I will be starting a new campaign in UFO2:ET after I finish up here so keep an eye out for that playthrough.

 

- Zombie

[Zombie]

Sorry, I kinda paused this Let's Play as I didn't have enough content for an episode and now I have too much so this may be a two-parter. My Nightwolfs shot down a cruiser so the team went in as usual. There was one 2x2 alien nearby when we zone in so Mephistoex crept closer to see what it was: a Vipon Commander! Ah-ha! One stun grenade later and it was unconscious. Other than that, there were Larvas on the mission too so we had to be a little careful. Our waspkeeper armor I think is nearly impervious to Larva chem weapons so getting hit isn't too worrisome anymore.EOM Report:

 

 

My scientists finished researching another Vipon Commander from the packed alien containment. Must've been a party in there with all those Vipon and Preacher commanders milling around waiting to be interrogated.

 

 

As I said before, I'm trying to knock out all these lesser projects so the topic list is pared down and easier to read. And it gives me a chance to get some low-key manufacturing done with my scant 10-man team. I don't want to tip the boat until I have my manufacturing capability fully up and running again. I researched a couple more commanders and took a peek at the research list again and the vipons are gone. Now it's Preachers:

 

 

So it does seem like the game handles the alien containment queue properly. I still think it may be glitched a bit as I captured a lot of vipon commanders before I even got to the preachers. However, after more research in the commanders the preachers were off the list and the vipons were back. And then there were none left:

 

 

Meh, whatever, commanders are easy enough to knock out and I have plenty of stun grenades left. But it seems like the game isn't counting all the commanders I captured in containment. Of course, maybe I'm to blame with rebuilding my main base with two alien containment modules? Only way to tell is to capture more commanders.

 

So this is the end-game ship research tab that opened up:

 

 

Without going into too much detail and giving away the entire plot, this is kinda like the Avenger in UFO:EU. What's different is that you need to research the projects in the list and then manufacture the things for the ship to make it space worthy. That's gonna take some time to complete and once I start I don't want to stop.

 

Before the end of the month I decided to splurge and build two more bases. I definitely needed a base in Syrtis Maior as my relationship with them has been iffy at best. So I plunked one down there. In terms of getting the most bang for the buck I decided on putting the next in Medie which is directly south of my main base. I put it as far South as I could to

1. Provide an early warning system for UFOs coming up from the south,
    
   
2. Provide some radar overlap on Syrtis Maior to keep them happy, and
    
   
3. Provide interceptor support for my main base which only has two and sometimes three Nightwolfs stationed there
   

 

As you can see, they both increased their funding a bit. It's just going to take a while for the bases to become fully operational and start shooting down UFOs to get those levels higher.

 

Back at base my advanced workshop finished building so it's been a flurry of activity there trying to fill out all the items I was getting low on. I produced quite a few more suits of Waspkeeper armor as I'm sick and tired of swapping those on and off soldiers. And a load more personal particle shields for my soldiers (I had 30 some left before, now nearly 130). Particle rifles are going to be all the rage soon so now I have 7 extra rifles and 100+ rounds of ammo for it. We now have 7+ anti grav units to equip soldiers with and a crap-ton of mark III chem grenades, inferno grenades and antimatter grenades. And with two new bases and 10 new Nightwolfs in the cards this next month my engineers produced 10 particle ship shields, 10 imperator missiles and 10 AKEW cannons to equip them. Sold some stuff too to get some cash together again.

 

Back when I had my initial alien containment and a second under construction I noticed something odd when the second was built and I tried deconstructing the first: the game wouldn't let me get rid of either module as it said I had aliens in each of them. So a word to the wise: put your original alien containment somewhere out of the way where it's not going to interfere with much down the road and leave it there untouched. Eventually when you finish researching commanders you can deconstruct it to get a little space back. I'm at that point now where my AC list is empty so the game allowed me to deconstruct my initial AC module. My newer AC module is still present just in case I need to research more commanders down the line.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

So the race is on, Zombie - now we know them critters' greedy appendages are all over our Avonium and if they succeed in accruing enough we'll face pandemonium and collapse.

 

Good thing we've got as far along as we did tech-wise as that ship you've got planned is the only silver bullet we can shoot to get at the source in time.

 

Another month in the bag and it's all "Good" and up in the state ratings. All told that's just a measly $6 Million though and it's evident that the equipment sales you've arranged for are the real mainstay of our budgetary viability.

 

Looking forward to seeing those extra particle rifles in the hands of our soldiers and, of course, the ten new Nightwolfs out there, dishing out the pain that will be our gain.

[Zombie]

Here's part two. Kinda enough for two posts again, but I'll cram it all in here. UFO activity has been really light as of late, or if I do see something big like a battleship I always seem to have to shoot it down over water. And I'm not going to reload to get a better roll on where it shows up/where it goes. A cruiser was shot down though so it was something at least. But then again, it was chasers and larva which don't provide much xp for a kill. You just can't win sometimes. I have a win on my team with Mephistoex though, he killed everything.

 

 

Research has been progressing at a decent pace and I ran out of normal topics so I started on an advanced one: spaceship alloys because alloys normally lead to armor, right? Well, it does and something extra too which I didn't realize:

 

 

I'm going to get that "Desert Tortoise" armor out of the way first as I might need it.

 

 

Or not. Only 30 chemical resistance? No thanks, larva are still a concern and besides, the waspkeeper armor is superior. Don't understand the rationale for it's existence if the previous version of armor is clearly better in every respect. Needless to say, I started research on the JAG-D1 interceptor. In the meantime we were able to shoot down a battleship over land (finally)! More chasers and larva, seems like a common theme recently. Mephistoex did the majority of the killing again but a few soldiers couldn't help themselves and stole a kill.

 

 

Research into the JAG interceptor finished which opened up a new transport:

 

 

Obviously we need this new transport as it can fit 8 soldiers plus two special "holds" for vehicles. As a bonus it has a couple hardpoints on it for shooting down UFOs or protection and a shield slot too. So I started research on this. Let's take a look at that JAG interceptor:

 

 

Best you can get, but this is a conundrum: I just built a couple new bases and both are nearly filled with Nightwolfs now and at my main base I have one hangar for aircraft construction. Do I hold off on the JAGs and go for the transport first or maybe forge ahead with the JAGs and fit the transport in between? I opted to construct two new JAGs for my main base as it's shorthanded in UFO encounters and to transfer the two Nightwolfs out to the two new bases. Nightwolfs are holding their own against UFOs so it's not like we absolutely need a complete new fleet of JAGs to handle stuff. After that we'll have a hangar free to produce the Devil Fish. Soon enough and research into that finished so let's take a look at it's stats:

 

 

It's great but the cost is unreal. Time to hold another fire sale to afford this. Got my balance to $60 million space bucks and started production. The UFOpaedia entry claims it's a nightmare to produce but I don't see what the fuss is about as my engineers cranked one out in 17 hours flat. After the JAGs and Devil Fish and extra weapon+cannon+shield for it we were down to $40 million. Going to have to be careful from this point forward with spending as I don't have enough UFO activity to replenish reserves. Hope this changes for the better.

 

I think I finished the last topic in the "aliens intentions" line of research:

 

 

We'll find out if theres more if/when I capture another alien commander. Might have a chance at it as I shot down a battleship again. I didn't send a transport over there immediately as it was nighttime. Glad I didn't because as my Nightwolfs were heading back to base, another battleship showed up for retaliation. Tried shooting it down but it wanted nothing to do with us and started a base defense mission.

 

Up until this point I had one tank as it came with the base when I started the game and never used it except on base defense missions. With the advent of the Devil Fish transport, it would be stupid to run it around without two vehicles assigned to it so I built the two best variants as those topics had been researched for a long time. Never got a chance to assign them to the new transport as I was waiting for UFO activity. Anyhow, when I zone in there's three tanks and only 8 soldiers. Crap. Well, let's do this guys. Used a tank for each doorway in the hangar and the normal tank in the middle of the hangar as a backup and 4 soldiers at each door. This time it was terror floaters and preachers. Great. At least there's some xp available. It was a hard fight but we prevailed.

 

 

Only 13 aliens though because the battleship was damaged when it landed. Kinda gave everyone a chance at killing but you can bet the chem grenades were being thrown around with reckless abandonment. No commanders though, maybe they died from the damage before they could spawn in.

 

So anyway, next up is to visit that crashed battleship and hopefully gain some more ufo equipment and weapons to sell. Not to mention the bounty. The cash is needed.

 

- Zombie