Two Quick Questions

[Zombie]

While doing some more testing in the underground Cydonian base complex I made a couple of interesting observations.

 

First, for the computer version of X-COM, the Cydonian underground base has a random layout every time you enter. However, in the Playstation version of the game, the base layout is exactly the same every time you visit! That kinda helps a bit if you already know where to look for the aliens. I just happened to start multiple Cydonia missions in a short period of time, and thought that the base design looked very familiar. By golly, the next new mission I started, the base was exactly the same.

 

Second, if you bring an entire compliment of just soldiers (26) to Cydonia and are able to get the whole crew to the next level, the spawn point factor will come into play. Anything more than 23 soldiers will immediately trigger the game to spawn one less Sectopod. It's gotta be because your troopers are clogging up some of the 2x2 alien spawn points! In addition, if you can get all 26 guys down there, 4 will be randomally inserted at various points throughout the base. Exceptions: the "brain" command center, the complex with the long corridoor leading to an upstairs room with the 4 doors, and the laboratory/storage area. Other than that, your extra soldiers will be anywhere.

 

I am actually starting to prefer the random insertions, because those troops act as advance scouts for psi attacks. Once most of the aliens are rounded up through psi, I send a couple rookies with high psi down that corridoor leading to the brain room. Then I blast the Ethereal guards and kill one part of the brain. Or if I am feeling especially lazy, I'll toss a HE pack underneath the brain and forego those Ethereals alltogether.

[Bomb Bloke]

The brain has 40 armor and 40 HE blockage.

 

The 'big tile' flag doesn't make a tile indestructable. You can blast dirt, for example, even if you will need the HP for the job.

[Zombie]

So 40 for armor and 40 for HE Blockage. if I'm not mistaken you need to get at least 40+40=80 hit points before the item appears damaged, right? That explains why my test with the high explosives indicated 80.

 

But why can lasers dealing 60, destroy? There must also be a "Laser" Blockage, "Plasma" Blockage and "Armor Piercing" Blockage too. If the armor is always a constant, then the "Laser" and "Plasma" Blockage numbers must be 20!

[Bomb Bloke]

Perhaps you need to deal damage equal to the armor to destroy a tile, and if the damage type is HE, you need to deal the additional damage? For example, the brain would, under those rules, take 40 points of damage to destroy, unless you used HE, in which case you would require 80 points of damage.

[Zombie]

Perhaps you need to deal damage equal to the armor to destroy a tile, and if the damage type is HE, you need to deal the additional damage? For example, the brain would, under those rules, take 40 points of damage to destroy, unless you used HE, in which case you would require 80 points of damage.

 

Nope. The Laser Pistol deals 46 for damage and is ineffective against the brain. According to your theory, any weapon with damage greater than 40 will harm it. That's completely untrue.

 

I double checked the Tank/Cannon who's AP rounds are rated for 60. Yes indeed, those shells can damage the brain. What that means is any weapon rated 60 or higher (other than HE) will destroy brain segments. Therefore, the brain must have a separate Blockage number for these types of weapons. I do not know if the game has separate Blockage numbers for the individual ammo types, or just lumps them all into the same category. It could be either. In either case, that number has got to be 20.

[Bomb Bloke]

Hmm... Interesting. Well, if Hobbes doesn't know, then I'm stumped.

[Zombie]

The 0 setting is only used for Scouts/Civilians. There are several 0 spawn points on all the other maps (farm, city, etc.) and the X-Com units are only generated inside the aircraft. Still you are probably right: maybe the program is set to use the 0 spawn point in case there are no more spawn points available to generate X-Com units. I recall someone mentioning that X-Com units can be generated on alien bases outside the lift maps and alien bases have several 0 spawn points.

But I am more inclined to it being a bug. I have found a couple of bugs on the map and terrain files but they don't really affect the game. Another possibility is that the 0 spawn point on the Stores module was meant to place an alien unit there, like it happens on TFTD where you have alien spawn points on the stores. But since it is set to Any setting it still doesnt make sense, so probably they simply forgot to correct it.

Whoa, this is an old topic. Time for a bump then.

 

I just fixed the routes for the General Stores so that large aliens don't spawn in that location anymore. You can find the fix in our files section here.

 

Just to elaborate on the above discussion, the 0 spawn point we were talking about was actually referring to the "flags" field of the node and I don't know what that is used for. The spawn probability of the node is 5 which means that a unit will show up there five times more often than a spawn probability of 1. As for the type of unit which can spawn in that location, "any" means that any alien unit whether it is large or small will be placed there. The General Stores was not meant to have aliens show up in the module anywhere (nevermind large) - it is an obvious map programming error as all the other nodes are reserved for X-COM units. For this reason I fixed it to spawn small X-COM units only. I suppose the true intention for that spawn point is to reserve it first for X-COM tanks and then soldiers but I figured there are enough tank spawn points already. Besides, trying to get a soldier downstairs and through the door is a real hassle if a tank is blocking the way.

 

- Zombie