TFTD on Superhuman. OWCH !

[Direwolf007]

I've went back to X-COM after about three years of it collecting dust on the shelf, since after getting UFO: Aftermath I just had to go back for more fun. This time, however, I decided to play a no-reload game. I jacked up the difficulty to Superhuman and began the game.

 

One word: HELP !

 

In the first month I got one UFO landing site, three crashsites, a *base attack* and a terror site.

 

I lost around 25 soldiers in these six missions. Argh. The base attack was a real bitch. I nearly got wiped out, started with 13 men, ended up with 2. I had a bunch of Aquatoids and ****load of Calcinites roaming around, including three Commanders (I managed to stun one. Hee hee), who would mind control just about anyone who got within sight range of any alien. The Aquatoids, however, weren't as nearly as bad as the Calcinites, with their insane TUs and one-touch-one-kill attack. I had three guys with Gauss Rifles, the rest with Gas Cannons, Gauss Pistols and Harpoons. Jessssus. Only the GRs would bring them down, and the least shots it ever took me was 3. Man. I lobbed three grenades at one of the bastards, hit him with 7 gauss pistol shots, and he proceeded to rip three men to shreds as soon as I hit end turn. OWCH. The only consolation was that Calcinites seem to suffer from claustrofobia, and almost never enter small rooms, so I could peek out, take potshots at them and run to hide in a closet. LoL...

 

Next came the terror site in Vladivostok. Gillmen and Deep Ones. I am currently on the first few rounds, and doing rather good. But I am yet to set foot outside the Triton. Although that did not stop from taking out some 5 Gill Men who drew too close to the craft. I do think it will turn into a slaughter as soon as I get out, though....

 

Anyways, my point being, any tips to surviving the first few months of the alien war ??

[NKF]

The best advice I can give you is: Take it easy. There's no need to rush things. Plan your moves.

 

I think the next best advice I can give you is to entirely focus your research on obtaining Mag. Ion Armour.

 

The difficulty is indeed insane, but once you get the armour, it evens out a bit. And besides, the armour is a major requirement for getting the submarines later on, so you might as well get it quick. Until you can crank these out, rely on your SWS to draw fire and to take the brunt of the damage. Build and use some aqua armour in the meanwhile, as meagre protection is far better than no protection.

 

Use the SWS to spot the aliens, and then have your soldiers, who are well beyond the alien's line of sight, do all the dirty work. The aliens cannot shoot back at what's not in their visual radius.

 

Deep-ones are easier to take down than the calcinites, so you needn't bother yourself with pounding these to bits. Though their attacks are quite lethal. Make sure you capture one alive as early as you can. It's a major research bottleneck.

 

If you've dealt with calcinites - research their corpse to get the vibroblades. Upgrade them if you wish - then hand them out to everyone that can carry them in addition to their own gear. They're very handy in tight spots - particularly on the ship missions and when defending your base, where there are a lot of small rooms and long corridors.

 

Try to use your Triton's doors to your advantage - particularly if the Triton lands on the eastern edge of the map. Wait in the Triton, open the doors and take pot shots at any passing alien then repeat. Don't disembark until you've taken out a generous number of their units. Yes, it's time consuming, but it does mean the threat around the LZ will not be as great. In terror sites, it also means you'll negelect the safety of the civilians (who mostly get slaughterd on the first round anyway) - though it's better to have a slightly negative score than to lose all your soldiers and the ship.

 

Cover. There's not much underwater, but with what little there is, make use of it.

 

Gain the higher ground. This gives you a clearer view of the field. Underwater, there aren't very many places you can walk to that elevate you over the field - until you get Mag. ion armour. On land, it depends on the map. In port missions, those iron towers are good sniper posts. The isle resort missions have those large hotels.

 

Unlike UFO, TFTD's grenades have unusually high armour, so you can safely stack multiple armed grenades on top of each other. A most excellent strategy for the sonic pulsers.

 

- NKF

[Bomb Bloke]

...

 

What was that about stacking grenades and grenade armor? I think I'm missing a huge point there somewhere.

[Jman4117]

Have you ever tried blowing up a proxy-nade in TFTD?

 

Did't work like UFO, huh.

[NKF]

Well, ever notice how, that after you've shelled a place multiple times, and when the dust clears, the only thing left remaining are the pulsers?

 

The armour for grenades in TFTD are so high that it's difficult to destroy most of them (with pulsers having the most armour). So, you can stack multiple armed grenades on the same spot, and they'll blow up one after the other. With every blow reducing the target's under armour, making every subsequent explosion more deadly.

 

Actually, you can destroy the proximity mines if the explosive is strong enough (pulsers). But doing that with an armed mine is bad. The next object to occupy the slot that originally held the proximity mine is treated like an armed mine. Sort of like the proxy-mine bug in the collectors edition, only this works in any edition.

 

- NKF

[cyrus]

Well, I'd used this incredible grenade armor to stack grenades under the Lobby. Threw two or three high explosives and two grenades on top of it and they all exploded one after the other. That's very useful.

 

Speaking of destroying proxies. You need this to deactivate them, yes. Well, I think the best way to deactivate them in TFTD is simply to reload. After that, the mines will still be there, so you'll be able to get them back after the mission, but they won't be useful until the next mission.

[BladeFireLight]

Well, I'd used this incredible grenade armor to stack grenades under the Lobby. Threw two or three high explosives and two grenades on top of it and they all exploded one after the other. That's very useful.

 

Speaking of destroying proxies. You need this to deactivate them, yes. Well, I think the best way to deactivate them in TFTD is simply to reload. After that, the mines will still be there, so you'll be able to get them back after the mission, but they won't be useful until the next mission.

The perox disarm bug is only in the dos 1.0 version. it dosent work in the 2.0 verson of TFTD

 

-Blade FireLight

[Zombie]

Well, I'd used this incredible grenade armor to stack grenades under the Lobby. Threw two or three high explosives and two grenades on top of it and they all exploded one after the other. That's very useful.

Topic:

 

So I'd like to hear everyone's opinion on this. See, the destruction values for the following explosives are all really high:

 

Grenade			   Dest. Value
Sonic Pulser			  150
Magna-Pack				140
Particle Disturbance	  150
Magna-Blast			   150
Dye Grenade			   110

Basically none of these items can be destroyed short of a DPL bomb. Do you think this was a conscious decision by the developer/programmers? It looks like they were fooling around in obdata.dat quite a bit, but I'm not convinced this is what was really intended. Their whole goal was to make the game harder, and this grenade "feature" goes against that philosophy. Unintentional glitch?

 

Discuss.

 

- Zombie

[Bomb Bloke]

If a grenade gets destroyed, it doesn't go off, right? Likely this was done for a realism effect.

 

(Unless I'm wrong and they explode anyway, in which case I have no idea).

[Knan]

In UFO, the first grenade blows away any others that are live nearby, so they don't go off.

 

Thia may be a change to give people a fighting chance...

[Zombie]

If a grenade gets destroyed, it doesn't go off, right? Likely this was done for a realism effect.

 

(Unless I'm wrong and they explode anyway, in which case I have no idea).

Grenades do not get destroyed by blasts of their own kind in TFTD. That's why you can have suicide bombers: equip a soldier with as many primed explosives as he/she can carry, then run up to an alien (like the Lobsterman). If the soldier gets killed, all the explosives fall to the ground and detonate successively.

 

Thia may be a change to give people a fighting chance...

Maybe, but like I said before it makes things easier. And TFTD was not supposed to be easy.

 

In one memorable encounter my squad found a group of Aquatoids all about 4 tiles away from each other. Tossed 3 Magna-Blast grenades right in the center and the explosions took out all the aliens. In my most recent campaign I have been using the Sonic Pulsers almost exclusively. If one doesn't kill an alien, a second one should, so I usually toss 2 of them at the feet of an alien just to be sure. Boom, boom!

 

- Zombie