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Grossbeer

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It's got nothing to do with money, well medkits kind of have I guess, but the weapons are very different. Do you really want to create a black-market dealing in these weapons during a time of economic strife? It's all well and good only selling to reputable nations but sooner or later they'll reverse-engineer them and start selling to the whole world anyway so realistically we'd be out of the market within a few months of making the first sale anyway.

 

And it's realism I'm debating here. Once the technology gets out it'll be mass produced all over the world and 250 techies in a pointless XCom base can't keep up with international manufacturing giants. That makes the in-game ability to constantly profit from things like Gauss completely unrealistic and again just a way of cheating. The sale of alien artefacts however is another story and while the moral implications remain they can't be manufactured so XCom can control the number in circulation and control where they go. Plus they can ensure they always have more of them and the buyers would have to keep coming back for ammo anyway lol.

 

But realism aside my point is we just don't need to mess around with a million engineers making gauss rifles to arm the masses if we keep making enough money anyway. We're a paramilitary organisation with international funding which is further subsidised by the sale of alien corpses and the like. If I was in charge of XCom, pumping out medkits to make a few extra bucks would be the last thing on my mind! It's not like you get to keep the money anyway, there are no shareholders in XCom...

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It's got nothing to do with money, well medkits kind of have I guess, but the weapons are very different. Do you really want to create a black-market dealing in these weapons during a time of economic strife? It's all well and good only selling to reputable nations but sooner or later they'll reverse-engineer them and start selling to the whole world anyway so realistically we'd be out of the market within a few months of making the first sale anyway.

 

And it's realism I'm debating here. Once the technology gets out it'll be mass produced all over the world and 250 techies in a pointless XCom base can't keep up with international manufacturing giants. That makes the in-game ability to constantly profit from things like Gauss completely unrealistic and again just a way of cheating. The sale of alien artefacts however is another story and while the moral implications remain they can't be manufactured so XCom can control the number in circulation and control where they go. Plus they can ensure they always have more of them and the buyers would have to keep coming back for ammo anyway lol.

 

But realism aside my point is we just don't need to mess around with a million engineers making gauss rifles to arm the masses if we keep making enough money anyway. We're a paramilitary organisation with international funding which is further subsidised by the sale of alien corpses and the like. If I was in charge of XCom, pumping out medkits to make a few extra bucks would be the last thing on my mind! It's not like you get to keep the money anyway, there are no shareholders in XCom...

 

Well, funding would be a concern given how little the countries pay. I mean, last hope of yoomanity here. Getting the same as X-Com 1 after 4 decades of inflation is a bit not enough.

 

As for the reverse engineering? Always figure it, given the evidence in game, like so.

 

For anyone but X-Com it's an slow process, contrary to what the film Collateral shows. Your team is the best of the best on the science and engineering front, and paid accordingly.

 

Someone else could eventually figure the stuff out, sure, but not within the timeframe available. World's best engineers, world's best scientists, world's best intelligence set up, and presumably world's best patent lawyers mean a lot for lengthening exclusivity.

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I've no intention of building a base dedicated to manufacturing. We don't "need" to, and normally I wouldn't "waste" money on a secondary base at all (it'd take too long to make it worthwhile). The only things worth spending it on is research and manufacturing, as those are the only things that'll get us to then through the T'leth mission (which is our actual goal here - all that "protecting the earth" nonsense is really just an excuse to gather research samples, and once we have those, all we need to do is keep our score/cash figures above 0 until we win).

 

That said, the "manufacturing" economy's got nothing on the amount of money we'll drag in from selling alien weaponry/corpses/building materials recovered from the field. When you consider that the whole "building things for cash" aspect is obviously an intended game mechanic (it's not some non-obvious exploit like the transfer bug), it makes sense to have our engineers do something whenever we've got nothing better for them to do. Which won't be all the time, mind you.

 

Research is the driving force behind our progress in the game, and at the moment we can't really afford to hire the amounts of scientists I'd prefer to have. I'd really like to see an extra hundred on the payroll, but that's over 6mill just to acquire them... Last I saw, we barely had over half that, and I doubt the funding nations are giving us to cover those sort of costs on a monthly basis. We've got enough money to stay in the game, sure, but not enough to clear the research backlog we've already built up in a reasonable amount of time.

 

Sure, we could keep payrolls low and waddle through the game slowly, but it's pretty much a given that we'll win eventually. The only challenge is in doing so quickly.

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well you are right partly Veteran. i can only speak of my experiances with them iron man campaigns so here it goes:

i DID built that kind of base mainly to boost my finaces, but i ened up building equipment for the troops nearly all the time. since building new subs (mantas, hammerheads i dont particular like a bit) takes considerable time. we will (hopefully) have 8 bases by the time mantas come along, and we should stock each base with one manta (and leave one barra for some of the small usos). the 250 engi base came in REALLY handy as well as mass producing aqua plastic armor, sonic rifles/ammo (yeah i still produce them because in late game nearly no one are to be found anymore), drills and tanks. My "monyproducing" workshop base ended up to be my main Warmachinery. So i dont really think it would be such a bad idea starting that kind of base.

If we build it with that layout it will take some time to complete anyways, draining only little money over time, and paying off later in difficult times.

 

so i still vote for a workhorse base

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Just a quick update that the tac mission is in progress right now, keep your fingers crossed!

 

EDIT: Done with the mission, I think this is actually the first time I don't lose anyone on a port attack, and on Superhuman \o/

 

Regarding the manufacturing base discussion, I usually build one but it would be fun to try without making one (and it is more realistic anyways, as TJ pointed out). Perhaps we can just build bases for detection only at first (dock + sonar + large sonar and that's it, or optionally with a living quarters and a store for garrison), then scale one or two of them to be strike bases if needed?

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There's actually nothing wrong with a lot of what each of us is trying to achieve or how we want to achieve it - we just can't afford most of it at the moment. But I'm going with CP with this one - we start off with small listening/intercept bases and expand to whatever functions we want as cash becomes available.

 

As for how we are progressing, I do think the research is going swimmingly well with just the 50 scientists, since we are going all out on the key technologies we'll be using on a regular basis. I'm actually surprised how much we've achieved with just two revolutions.

 

Speaking of bases, I was thinking: Why don't we assign some of the non-primary base slots to each player (as we fill them)? Not to own, but to design the layout. Be it clever or utterly mad - that's just part of the fun. ;) I have my idea of how I'd like to build an intercept outpost and I'm sure many others will have theirs. Rather than argue over what is best, this would be a reasonable compromise. When we can afford them, of course! Thoughts?

 

- NKF

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I'm with NKF and CP that we should concentrate in detection and interception bases. Everything else after that can wait a while but we need to be covering the globe with our sonar asap. After all more detections means more missions which will in turn lead to more loot and extra cash. Simples...

 

Grossbeer I know this playthrough is your brainchild but I strongly disagree with the notion of a manufacturing facility and if at any point we begin to build one you'll be losing a commander. I can happily play this game without the co-op but it'll never be as much fun. If each one of us decides on their own specific tactic and pursues it despite having no support though, well then it stops being fun and it stops being coop too.

 

And that's my last 2-cents.

 

EDIT : Stunning mission CP, absolutely unbelievable! And all rookies too!!! Well mostly I think weren't they, I killed the good ones last turn haha 21 : 0 is a pretty good score in anyones book though, I vote CP gets another turn lmao

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Well veteran if its that a big a deal building the Workhorse base that u would leave this coop i can gladly drop the issue ^^ no problem here. I was just pointing out the tactical purpose of one but hey...

 

NKFs suggestion of dedicating bases to commanders sounds fun but: we will be building one base at a time (as money doesent suffice for every commander building a base) meaning the 2nd base will be built be all commanders over time i guess. perhaps later on when money is there in heaps we could think about this again.

 

Listening posts are more important i agree, one can always extend the bases to skrike bases and the like. i strongly suggest tho that we extend the listening posts right after to interceptor bases. and additionally alwas have a garrison.

 

And CP: im not sure if we are at superhuman anymore looking at the past missions ^^ great job! im still waiting for tougher aliens :-D

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Listening posts are more important i agree, one can always extend the bases to skrike bases and the like. i strongly suggest tho that we extend the listening posts right after to interceptor bases. and additionally alwas have a garrison.

 

Agreed, I think that's the best way forward as and when we can and I'm still in support of the idea of halving the globe, so somewhere in the pacific for a new base would probably be good. Near Japan or Australasia. Radars-Interceptor-Troopers seems like the most sensible way to progress new bases though. After that it's not so important but for now at least I imagine reaching that point with a new base will signal time to build another new one and do it all again!!!

 

And CP: im not sure if we are at superhuman anymore looking at the past missions ^^ great job! im still waiting for tougher aliens :-D

;) You had to go and say it didn't you lol Photon may have just played a blinder but lets not forget the 11 casualties we just took! If I don't see a lobby till late next year it'll be too soon ;)

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well that 2 parter with the 11 casuaties i still count as a major victory! 500 points and loads of equipment ;)

i guess im used to more slaughter ^^. in my iron man campaign my trtons are already called triton 15 16 and so on if u know what i mean ;)

 

okay silencer ill take the next round then.

 

greez

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haha thanks GB, I count it as a victory too but still could have gone a bit smoother ;) I can think of a few troopers who could've survived the fight with some more brains and a few more who were just plain unlucky! What really takes the cake is how well Photon's terror site went though. I killed 42 aliens with 11 losses then he comes along and does 21 for 0 lmao
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im not sure if we are at superhuman anymore looking at the past missions

 

Assuming you are not joking ;), I just uncompressed the savegame on another install of TFTD that has XcomUtil and it confirms that we are on superhuman:

 

XcomUtil 9.60 for XCOM/UFO and TFTD by Scott T Jones, Scott@ScottTJones.com

This program modifies saved game files or program files. Use at your own risk,

only after making backups. I am not liable for any damages this may cause.

 

Terror shared 2040.04.05 08:26

 

TFTD saved game at Superhuman difficulty level (EXP:6) with $4463651

 

Bases: HQ

 

Remember that the higher the difficulty, the more (and tougher) the aliens are. I think you'd hardly see that many aliens on beginner level.

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All the big missions like the terror sites, port missions and colonies have well over 20 aliens per map. We're definitely not on beginner!

 

I wonder if we're going to miss out on the drills though? We haven't had an Aquatoid land mission to get any Calcinite corpses yet. It's mostly Gillmen lately, and they're usually scarce.

 

- NKF

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Welcome to the club Grossbeer ;) And I'd consider that another good mission, no human lives lost after all, so stop your whining lol Remember we skipped silencer so the next mission can be either him or BB. Just make sure whoever takes it claims it in here first so we don't end up with both playing at the same time lol
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All things considered BB, I don't blame you for cutting the mission short. We're starting to hit the big-time enemies.

 

I'm going to make an educated guess and say that colony is going to be supplied by Lobstermen. This'll make farming the fleet supply cruisers difficult, but at least we're guaranteed no MC attacks.

 

I'm up next. I don't know if there'll be enough time to mount an attack on one of the easier colony construction subs, but we'll see how it goes.

 

Edit: Okay, so I managed to take one down. Don't have the time to begin the tactical segment right now, so expect the second half tomorrow.

 

- NKF

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Yeah, I knew it was gonna happen eventually, it was just a question as to "when".

 

When the Pulse shell went off, the only units outside were a soldier and the HWP; I didn't want to send a bunch out as I knew full well the blast was gonna happen sooner rather then later, but I really wanted to bring back that launcher if I could. I figured I'd be able to mop up the remaining forces outside the Dreadnought so long as the tank was drawing attacks, and the critter holding the weapon must've been at least somewhat crippled. I doubt we'll get another chance as good as that one for a while, but I guess it kinda put things in perspective when everyone not in the Triton got wiped out.

 

May be worth scouting that base I found with a patrolling Triton in order to see which race is supplying it. This should be done anyway, as it seems a new base is going to show up in that area soon anyways. Once our research really gets up to speed, we can jump in and grab the research subjects we need; in theory those two bases should get us to T'Leth (assuming we don't get really lucky and have the Lobbys attack our base head-on).

 

Would be worth considering Shok (stun) bomb research once the MC Lab construction is underway as they not only work really well on Lobstermen, we specifically need some of their Commanders to win (and we really don't want to have to fight them more then we have to).

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Bad luck BB, don't think anyone would've been crazy enough to try and complete that mission! And welcome to the tank-busters club! Population 3 ;) At least NKF only has a tiddler this time but if it is from the base doesn't that mean it could still be lobs :s
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yep good descision indeed BB. One has to have the heart for it too. But well, with lobsters and tentaculants DPLs and no drills it was clear we had to bail out.

 

i think itl be supplied by lobsters too as the very large one was filled by lobsters as well. i hope we get a terror mission soon with calcinites. i want them drills ;)!!

 

greez

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All the same these Lobstermen sure take a pounding! We need something that can take them down fast.

 

By the way, I had a little hiccup when I first posted my tactical segment, so stuff wasn't uploaded properly and I hadn't edited out most of the glaring errors. Should be fixed now.

 

- NKF

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