Stunned aliens

[Kernel]

Why does a heavily stunned alien wake up if you pick him up?

This happened to me the other day.

 

I was loosing a terror mission badly so I decided to get out of there.

But, rather than come out of it with nothing I thought I would take back a few stunned aliens with me. So had one of my guys pick up a heavily stunned chrysalid (and by heavily I mean 4 or 5 stun bombs) but as soon as the turn ended the chrysalid woke up and prompty turned my guy into a zombie.

I wouldn't mind so much but the guy was a high ranking soldier.

[JellyfishGreen]

There's no way to tell how stunned they are without a mind probe - your chrys must have only been lightly stunned and due to wake up the next turn.

 

Eg. The stun bomb put him under the stun/health threshold by maybe 3 points. And probably subsequent stun bombs had no effect, because he was already out?

 

But I'm pretty sure picking them up has nothing to do with it.

 

Have you tried using more duct tape on your captives?

[NKF]

You cannot increase an alien's paralysis once the alien's already stunned. Why? Technically, what you see on the ground is just a temporary 'corpse'-shaped ground item that refers to the alien you stunned, but it's not the alien itself. Any further damage will be done to the item, and not the unit it refers to. This would also explain why detonating an explosive on the unconcious alien with tough armour kills it. The explosion checked itself against the object's armour rather than the alien's. Makes sense? No? Well, never mind, it's not necessary to know this to enjoy the game.

 

For future reference, I'd recommend throwing the body rather than holding on to it -- even if it won't help much on account of it being a Chryssalid.

 

- NKF (geekius extraordinaire slobbus)

 

Interesting note for those who have not experienced this yet: If you're flying and holding on to a stunned alien that's about to wake up, the alien will wake up and end up 'standing' in the air right beside you. Normally in the tile just to the north of you (like what happens when you revive a stunned soldier). In most circumstances, it'll try to walk, and fall to the ground level. But if it's a chryssalid or any other alien with a built-in hand-to-hand attack, watch out. Very important to remember this in TFTD when you decide to end alien colony missions by fleeing and abducting a lobsterman commander at the same time.

[JellyfishGreen]

I was going to appeal to NKF to back me up, but now I don't have to.

 

Duct tape the lobster claws. It's essential.

[The Demi-Godly One]

Sometimes when the aliens wake up in the air beside you they will not use their psi, one time I had a sectoid leader (Or maybe it was a commander ) wake up in the air beside me and it just stood there. Never using pis or even moving!

[Kernel]

Well I reloaded the mission to the point just after I stunned the chrysalid and I managed to complete it. The chrysalid was still stunned at the end of it all, probably about 6 or 7 turns after I tried to pick it up the last time. :dontgetit:

 

Either it's a bug in loading a game that was saved during combat or picking up an alien really does wake them up. I don't know.

 

Maybe I'll try some tests at some point.

[Rosstoid]

Can hand to hand attacks be used with reaction fire?

 

One of my latest tactics is too stun and alien, throw it against a wall and surround it with soldiers, rifles on their packs and stun rods out. So this way, the alien can't make an escapade. It is cornered, unarmed and in trouble with the sectoid leaders when they find out he was telling the alien secrets to the humans :alien2: . I would never try this with chrysallids though, for safety reasons .

 

I never try to take chrysallids alive. With the other aliens, they get dumped on the ground when they wake up, weak, weaponless and not a threat unless they do H&H attacks or psi. But if I accidentally stun one with laser fire, I drop a grenade (alien preferably) on the stunned alien. It normally prevents them waking up.