Is there an easy way to hunt for remaining aliens?

[Privateer]

This is really frustrating. I got a shipping line terror mission for the first time - the one on a container ship (not sure if there are others). My enemy is Aquanoids, so the battle was more of a massacre than a fight :devil: Well, at least after I got rid of their MC capable troops.

 

Now I'm pretty much done the cargo hold, but, apparently, there are still a few enemies around and I can't find them. The level is so big, with so many rooms and containers that it gets really annoying after you spend thirty minutes to an hour sniffing around for that last enemy.

 

Anyone wants to share their hunting tricks?

[FullAuto]

A slow, methodical sweep. Keep your men together and just check every room, corner, nook and cranny. That's all you can do. It's frustrating as hell, I know.

[BreakMage]

You're better off than me.

 

I have 1 person to do the entire cargo hold with, vs Tasoths and Bio Drones.

[cyrus]

Well, haven't any cargo ship missions, instead had to clear 3 cruise liners. But it also has many small rooms, so I'd suggest searching them successively. By the end of the missions it seems that the enemy stops moving so it would be a help. On the other hand it still may move a bit, so keep checking your motion scanner (you have the motion scanners, now do you?) in the beginning of your turn. It may be not a civillian, but this annoying hider. Also, be prepared, that it may reaction-shoot your soldier, so move them in groups of two or so. Don't keep the entire squad together, as this is ineffective. Spread them around the entire deck in theese small groups and soon you will find the enemy.

[NKF]

In some cases, the alien might just be in a fairly obvious area that you tend to overlook it. I once found an alien hiding in the Triton.

 

Sometimes you may even get an alien locator beacon but you don't actually see it. This often happens on staircases in the island resort mission. For some inexplicable reason, you cannot see the alien standing on the landing, even if you're standing right next to it, but you can see it if you're standing behind the stairs. I don't really understand it myself, but this is quite noticeable in the hotels (and some stairs in UFO's X-Com base modules)

 

Remember where aliens generally start. The spawn locations for the aliens become predictable after a while. You might even want to memorise general locations where the aliens always hide. In the luxury cruiser missions, the freezer in the kitchen is a good place to look. There's some weird line of site errors in the freezer, but it's not too difficult.

 

In ship missions, a methodical sweep of the rooms is often a good idea. Also remember to keep watch of any exits and entrances so that aliens don't get by you during the sweep.

 

- NKF

[Jman4117]

Uh.............cheat.

 

Also helps if you close doors behind you just in case something moves while you aren't looking, you know about it.

[Rattler]

For me it depends on the amount of time I have before I have to stop playing. If I have little time I save the game then just run my men around with out a care in the world. I drop their guns and stuff just to lighten the load and run them past everything. Once I find the alien I reload and proceed to that area.

 

If I have time I do what everyone else does, 3 men sweep room to room, closing doors behind me and leaving particle disturbance gernades in the hallways, and if I have the men to spare and I leave them in a postion where they can have an almost unobstuced veiw of everything(top the bridge on the cargo ship 1st lvl, ontop of buildings, if I'm under water and I mag ion armour I leave them 4 floors up in the middle of the map as basically bait)

[BladeFireLight]

If you coverd all your bases on the first time through you will not have to hunt for the last alien, however this it verry hard to do. so we all get stuck hunting them down. if you dont want to spend 2 hours looking for the last kill, use xcomutil with the 'vis' flag on it to show the entiremap.. then you will see where the alien is and can just go straight there and take him on. this is less of a cheat then using the auto kill method as you can still got shot.

 

the ship missions are natorious for this as the route maps for the aliens are terable and on the second part non existant on the top two levels. (have you ever seen the movie theater on the cruise liner?)

 

-Blade FireLight

[Privateer]

Yes, I've seen the theater. A bit after posting that first message I got a cruise ship terror mission. But I'm not sure why you should mention it. It looked like a regular room to me.

[cyrus]

I've seen the theatre also. But in the second part of the cruise ship missions, it seems that aliens spawn in the lower decs (particularly in the engine rooms) so they don't go up. So you can isolate them there, and it will be much easier to locate them. Though it seems that much of civillians also spawn there and then got killed in the first two or three turns.

[NKF]

I've seen Triscene prowling the halls outside the theatre. In fact, one of my first encounters with a land-bound Xarquid was on that level too (mixed terror site. Land Xarquids are as rare as the sea Deep-Ones you find in the final mission). I've not seen much else up there.

 

On the cargo ships, I've seen plenty of gill-men on the upper levels, sometimes in one or two bedrooms, but mostly on the railings just past the area you start, posing as snipers.

 

- NKF

[cyrus]

Land-bound Xarquid? Well, I've heard bout them, but how do they move. I mean in water it is natural to assume that they float, but on land?

[NKF]

Gas.

 

Xarquids are based off nautilus (really big nautilus with a gun shoved up their tentacles). Of course, in real life, nautilus move backwards, not forwards as the Xarquids do. If I'm not mistaken, gas (well, inflation) is a part of what propels them through the water (or raises/lowers them). I'm not sure. Marine biology texts might be a better source of reference than I am.

 

In the game, Xarquids move just like they do underwater. I think the game just goofed up and put in a xarquid when it should've put in a deep-one (which is what normally replaces them for land missions).

 

- NKF

[Nightshade]

Do what I do, Ignore the terror sites, dont u lose if 12 of them go unanswered? Seriously what r the odds of getting 12 ship attacks in a orw? But if u r going 2 ignore them land a ship there and leave straight away, it counts as a respons. Just a bad one coz u hav a score of minus someting and 3 zeros.

[Bomb Bloke]

It pays to at least turn up, then leave again if you wish to try that... you loose less points....

 

A few times now, I've found Xarquid stuck in one of the rooms on the second stage of the cruise liners. They get in this little four square bathroom behind a room, and the door is a single square so they can't get out...

 

Untill you open the door, they do nothing. Then they go nuts with autofire at point blank range. https://www.angelfire.com/games3/jeffy90/images/smilies/sad.gif

 

Odd how all three turned up in the same bathroom. The point being, if you find one there once, it would pay to check that spot next time round...

 

Wretched boats. Just remember to bring grenades, so you can blow some steam off. It feels so much more constructive to just blow all the wall down. (Well... those which GO down, anyway https://www.angelfire.com/games3/jeffy90/images/smilies/confused.gif ).