How many High Explosives?

[Cap'n Kyth]

Just as a point of interest, how many High Explosives does it take to obliterate the outer wall of a UFO?

 

Or will Alien Grenades suffice? (I have loads of these!)

[FullAuto]

Interior or exterior? Interior, alien grenades will do the job, exterior, I don't think so.

[Cap'n Kyth]

Exterior. I know a Blaster-Bomb can punch a 1-tile hole in an outer wall (and anything behind it), but that's not really enough, and B-Bombs are too valuable for me at the moment.

 

My Alien 'nades have a bad tendency of not even scarring the floor of a UFO. Or killing the reactor. But vaporising the alien corpses and weapons.

 

(And yes, they WILL vape a Floater if said Floater is right on top of the grenade when it explodes. )

[FullAuto]

If I remember correctly, an alien 'nade will punch a 1-square hole in the roof of A UFO, but won't do anything to an exterior wall.

[Cap'n Kyth]

I'm hoping the almighty NKF will know, being the XCom Knowledge Vault that he is.

[Bomb Bloke]

Haven't heard of alien grenades being able to punch through the roof, never tried it myself.

 

But if you want to go through an exterior wall, it's a blaster bomb or nothing. I think a blaster launcher tank isn't powerful enough, you're going to need a trooper to cart one around.

 

Oh, and walls need to be destroyed with a single blast, they don't take damage then crumble. A weapon either can do the job, or it can't. High Explosive can't. The very center of a blaster bomb explosion is about the only thing that can.

[Jman4117]

Unless you are on Mountain terrain, you can take out all kinds of things, including outer walls, with rockets, HE, and I believe alien nades. For interior walls, I think the heavy plasma is the only thing that will cut it other than a blaster bomb.

[NKF]

All walls in the game have constant hitpoints - or rather, constant armour points. Some walls can transition between being undamaged to damaged, but a damaged wall is not the same as an undamaged wall. No, no, let's get away from that or else I might confuse everyone.

 

So it's not a question of how many, it's a question of how powerful a weapon needs to be in order to break through a wall or change it to its next damaged state (like wooden walls).

 

---

 

As far as I can tell, high explosives will not destroy the outer hull. I've never personally blown away any inner hull walls either with the high explosive. Blasting through a wall (or walking through a wall) on the other hand is a completely separate topic.

 

The blaster bomb on the other hand is 82% (well, less, but more than 81%) more powerful than the high explosive, so it can jolly well punch through whatever it likes - unless the wall has really-really tough armour points, like the Skyranger.

 

---

 

Mountain terrain, as mentioned, breaks the mould. You can even destroy your Skyranger's ramp and landing gear with an alien grenade! This 'mountain terrain' influenced structural weakness only affects hard structures on the ground level.

 

- NKF

[Solitaire]

You just made me thign something NKF... I'd love to see a mod in which the skyranger can be destroyed mid mission, if such a thing happened there'd be no chance of retreat and you might have to buy another Skyranger and send it to the crash site after te mission to retrieve your men... or maybe they'd be automatically delived back to your base - minus all the alien artifacs and weapons the capture...

[Blehm 98]

hmm, if i remember correctly, i believe that xcomutil increases the firepower of HE to 200, which is just enough to blow through UFO outer hull. since HE had a power of 120, and HP had a firepower of 115, HE should be able to destroy inner hull

[storm turmoil]

I remember reading somewhere ( unofficial startegy guide? can't remember) that ufo hulls need 160 explosive damage to destroy.

 

that means blaster bombs ( 200 explosive) will do it most of the time. ( yes, it is possible to fire a blaster bomb at a hull and not destroy it; happened to me a few times, not common though). High explosive you would have to keep trying and hope that the random damage gives you a high result ( a result over 160. x-comutil does indeed increase the High explosives base damage value, however, it's still possible to not destroy the hull if you get a low damage variable. ( if I recall correctly, xcomutil ramps it to 200, same as a blaster bomb.

 

also, I think it is damage specific; that is, it has to be explosive dame or it wont work. otherwise, sooner or later, some of those 'eavy plasma shots ( damage 115 plasma) would luck out and get a high enough result to destroy the hull.

[Blehm 98]

only if HPs do high damage to the walls though. The explosives not working is only because of low rolls, but HP shouldn't be able to break through. NKF, please help

[Zombie]

Here's the deal, guys. For UFO's on normal terrain, nothing will punch through a hull except a Blaster Bomb. That's it.

 

For distinct "units" in the game (X-COM soldiers, Tanks, Civilians, Aliens, Terrorists, Robots, Zombies, etc), they have damage modifiers associated with them. The game will usually double the weapons listed strength and then modify it up or down depending on how susceptible that particular unit is to that ammo.

 

However, for inanimate objects damage modifiers appear not to apply. Objects have an armor rating and a "Blockage" rating. The relationship between these two numbers is not fully understood at the moment. According to Hobbes, the armor rating for a UFO hull is 100 and the HE Blockage number is also 100. Additionally, we do not know whether a weapons damage is multiplied by 2 like it is for units. It probably is not.

 

From my trials, HE packs will not destroy UFO hulls, and they have a strength of 110. A Hovertank/Launcher's fusion bomb has a listed damage of 140, and it too, will not destroy the hull of a UFO. The Blaster Bomb has a weapon strength of 200 and it barely does the job. (It never creates a hole larger than 1 tile wide). Add the armor and Blockage numbers for a UFO hull and you get 200. This is what I assume is the minimum damage necessary to open a UFO up. So if a weapon can meet or exceed the sum of these numbers, that tile will be destroyed.

 

For ceilings, it is a whole separate ball of wax. I'm gonna need to test this out to verify, but Heavy Plasma's and Blaster Bombs are the only two weapons which are able to open up a ceiling tile.

 

- Zombie

[FullAuto]

Heavy Plasmas? Really? I know they do a fine job on interior walls and doors, but ceiling tiles?

[Zombie]

Now, don't quote me on this one, but I remember testing out Heavy Plasmas and they worked on punching a hole in a UFO's ceiling, though it was difficult. Like I said, I'll have to do some more testing on this to verify since I last checked this around 7 years ago, and my memory may not be as good as I hope.

[Blehm 98]

yeah, my dad has tried before, HE does not blow through ceiling, i believe that only HP and blaster bombs do it. However, i also believe that nothing can do more than one space of damage, which seems to show that even though the ceiling are easier to break, they are are still extremely strong

[Jasonred]

UFO ceilings use the same type of walls as UFO interior walls and X-com Base Walls, right? AFAICT, Tank mounted Plasmas won't bust them, so, it's the BB and HP only for those.

 

... doubles the damage? ... huh? I thought that the damage listed in Ufopedia is the correct average damage, with a variance allowing the damage to go anywhere from 0 to double the listed damage. Or something like that anyhow.

 

I'm pretty sure there's SOME random variables thrown in the damage equation anyhow.

 

Further, I think for humanoids, the game has some adjustment to damage based on whether it was a torso hit, headshot, or limb hit. (AFAIK, headshots do more damage)

 

For interior UFO walls, the HP has a CHANCE of breaking it. Lower than 50%, but not sure how much lower.

 

ALSO, if I'm not mistaken, explosive damage has a different calculation involved. We all know the damage inflicted by explosives follows the "increases nearer the center of blast". BUT, in what increments? And, is the damage random or is it set? I have NEVER heard of a unit taking 0 damage from the center of a BB bomb. ANY unit. Whereas I have heard of even unarmored humans going unharmed from a Plasma pistol.

 

If you damage inanimate objects with explosives, you seem to get the same results every time, I believe. (with same blast radius) So, explosive damage seems a lot less random.

 

Same for fire damage. We know fire has some weird calculations and (preset?) damage. But I seem to notice that fire damage which seems to be a low-mid value consistantly destroys trees and stuff! Come to think of it, doesn't fire ignore armor? So, why doesn't fire destroy EVERYTHING on the map, just the "inflamable" objects?

 

URGH... anyhow, to those testing these out, I'd suggest concentrating on each type of damage type first. Plasma looks simplest, Incindiery look hardest.

[Zombie]

Further, I think for humanoids, the game has some adjustment to damage based on whether it was a torso hit, headshot, or limb hit. (AFAIK, headshots do more damage)

Nope, no adjustment. If the unit gets hit in a specific area of the body, it does not do any more damage than if that unit was hit somewhere else.

 

ALSO, if I'm not mistaken, explosive damage has a different calculation involved. We all know the damage inflicted by explosives follows the "increases nearer the center of blast". BUT, in what increments? And, is the damage random or is it set? I have NEVER heard of a unit taking 0 damage from the center of a BB bomb. ANY unit. Whereas I have heard of even unarmored humans going unharmed from a Plasma pistol.

It follows increments of 10 damage units per tile. So a grenade having 50 for damage will do 50 in the center, 40 one tile out, 30 two tiles out, etc. The damage is random (as all ammo is) if it is dealt against living units. Non-living things use the armor+Blockage idea I mentioned earlier.

 

Blaster Bombs do not have a minimum damage of 0 and go up to double damage. Not even close. The Min is 100 and the MAX is 300 (giving an average damage of 200 which is the listed number). High Explosive ammunition always do a minimum of damage greater than 0, whereas other ammo types (such as Plasma, Laser, AP, Stun) start at 0 and go to a possible double damage for the max.

 

If you damage inanimate objects with explosives, you seem to get the same results every time, I believe. (with same blast radius) So, explosive damage seems a lot less random.

Hence why I mentioned: "Additionally, we do not know whether a weapons damage is multiplied by 2 like it is for units. It probably is not". Since 200 is the total armor+blockage, and a Blaster does 200, it stands to reason that once those numbers are met a tile is considered destroyed. From what I can tell there is no variance (range) when dealing with objects. Only the max damage of the weapon counts.

 

Same for fire damage. We know fire has some weird calculations and (preset?) damage. But I seem to notice that fire damage which seems to be a low-mid value consistantly destroys trees and stuff! Come to think of it, doesn't  fire ignore armor? So, why doesn't fire destroy EVERYTHING on the map, just the "inflamable" objects?

Trees and "flammable" objects have a different (and much lower) armor+Blockage number than most objects do. In addition, if something catches fire it will incur some damage until the fire is out. However, most objects are not flammable and will not burn no matter how much fire is applied. Most likely, flammable objects either have an armor rating, or a Blockage number (not both). Me thinks it is the Blockage number since objects tend to burn up in 3 or so rounds.

 

- Zombie

[FullAuto]

If I remember right, whacking a BB into the roof of a battleship punches more than one hole in it. There's a 1-tile hole where the BB hits, yes, but then situated around it in a wide radius are some more holes. These don't show up on some other UFOs because their rooves aren't big enough.

[Bomb Bloke]

I have a sudden hunch that terrain affects weapon damage.

[NKF]

Just a quick word here:

 

Though the roof of the UFO looks like the same as the floor tiles, they are indeed different tiles altogether (those with map editors or viewers may be able to confirm this - I just peeked directly at the floor tile references in a battlescape map file for one of my games).

 

So, inside floors/ceilings with a heavy plasma - yes, the outer hull floor (it's a floor - but we perceive it as a ceiling/roof) would have the same armour level as the outer hull. Now, the underbelly of a battleship is constructed of your plain old inside floor/celing tiles, and should be exposed. I imagine you may be able to cut through that with a heavy plasma.

 

Also another quick note - you can deal damage through ceilings with explosives, but if the ceiling itself doesn't break, well, tough luck, but area effect damage does indeed go through a ceiling, so firing your autocannon HE shells at the ceiling won't have gone to waste, it'll still kill anything that's standing directly above you.

 

- NKF

[Cap'n Kyth]

So technically if a UFO is on a hill or somesuch (which is impossible, really, according to game logic) you could dig into the hill with lasers or plasmas, then use explosives to cut up through the ceiling and into the bottom of the UFO?

[Blehm 98]

if it works under normal circumstances then it should work under any circumstance. if it doesn't, then it shouldn't work any time

[Jman4117]

I routinely blow out the ceilings of UFOs with heavy plasma shots so it can't be just as strong as the sides of the hull....

[JellyfishGreen]

In response to the original poster's question, I assume everyone knows explosions don't combine in UFO like they do in Apocalypse, so 5 HE's on the same square is just a waste of HE.

 

So technically if a UFO is on a hill or somesuch (which is impossible, really, according to game logic) you could dig into the hill with lasers or plasmas, then use explosives to cut up through the ceiling and into the bottom of the UFO?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

A more likely application would be a flying suit with heavy plasma cutting a hole in the underside of the Battleship's main level and then flying up through the hole. I seem to remember, though, that you can fly up through certain overhangs without even cutting a hole first.

 

Strength recap:

100? interior wall

115 heavy plasma

110 high explosive

140 fusion tank round

160 Exterior (hull) wall

200 Blaster Bomb