XCOM: Enemy Unknown - Strategy Game - Developed by Firaxis

The design isn't precisely "one base," since you still get to build satellite and interception hubs elsewhere. As cube explains, this helps to keep the play more honest, so players don't build large, obvious, killzone bases to farm alien attacks (yes, I was often guilty of this). On harder diffs in XCOM, I'd often not care too much about world opinion - so long as one nation funded me, I could remain in the game and receive the bulk of my funding by selling alien artifacts - less a world defense organization and more of a black market alien body market supplier.

The legit base game in the original XCOM was meant to be based around detection and interception coverage anyway, so that game remains intact in this presumptive reimagining.

My main concern is squad size at the moment. Starting out with 4 is remarkably basic - 4 is the minimum size for a standard fire team in XCOM. If you had only one, you're looking at a dangerous, dangerous situation. I'd generally withdraw from intercepts gone bad if I had only 6 or less viable troops remaining.

I can see where they would want to start it out gently, and maybe ease the new folks into it, but I'd like for a higher diff setting to allow you to start off with a full intercept squad (at least two fire teams and a HWP).

Base defense and intercepts as minigames - I'd just like to go on the record to say that they need to have the basic XCOM functionality coded in there as a backup. If their new minigames prove to be, er, awful, then I'd like to be able to retro back into the old tolerable minis.

Who's to say that starting off with just 4 guys isn't really hard?

It's a question of complexity, not difficulty. Starting off with 4 guys in the original XCOM game would be positively suicidal. I don't do that, and I would not prefer it - because it'd be pointlessly hard. I'm willing to make some concessions for newbies, but I'd like it better if there's an option for them, and an option for more experienced gamers, especially when I'm firing up the game to revisit it some time 2018.

I've always played with only 4 soldiers. Always. From mission 1, to the last mission before Cydonia. Cydonia I take a full ship. But I always play with 4. Still, I agree. Options make a better game. Let us choose. If we wanna take 12 guys and an HWP, let us. If we wanna take 1 guy, let us.

LarryC wrote:

It's a question of complexity, not difficulty. Starting off with 4 guys in the original XCOM game would be positively suicidal. I don't do that, and I would not prefer it - because it'd be pointlessly hard. I'm willing to make some concessions for newbies, but I'd like it better if there's an option for them, and an option for more experienced gamers, especially when I'm firing up the game to revisit it some time 2018.

And who's to say that the game will play and be balanced exactly like the original?

I mean, come on. You're extrapolating way to far off of way too little information.

Would you tell a person who says they have a pain in their side that they've got a kidney problem or a swollen appendix because those are the symptoms? (I don't know if they can cause that or not) Or would you first get the history and make a physical examination?

kexx wrote:

I've always played with only 4 soldiers. Always. From mission 1, to the last mission before Cydonia. Cydonia I take a full ship. But I always play with 4. Still, I agree. Options make a better game. Let us choose. If we wanna take 12 guys and an HWP, let us. If we wanna take 1 guy, let us.

How do you do it? I'm guessing that with only 4 guys, you have to practice extreme vigilance?

Yeh, just 4 soldiers basically would mean either constant quicksave-load or endless replays. If you lose 1 of 4 soldiers you are really screwed. If you lose 2, you have basically halved your squad, rendering further advance impossible.
If it's just the starting stages, I dont care that much but having just 4 guys for the whole game would make it simply turn based Mass Effect. Not the pinnacle of tactical combat.

Yeah, lots of quick-saves / loads. I always have the following save files:

Globe.
Start of Turn
Amidst Turn
Panic, Berserk, Hurt
Mind-controlled

Granted, this method really cancels the difficulty, but I like getting attached to my 4 guys. Sometimes I go with 6, but very rarely. And eventually, when I get my blaster launcher, I keep one on the roof of my skyranger, for extreme situations. I spread my guys out, but I try to always have them able to look at each other, so I can save one from afar. Keep in mind I always purchase soldiers so my 4 guys have at least 55 aim, 50 bravery at the very start. Anything under those numbers, and they're fired.

Also, one of the first things I do whenever I start a new game, is I buy 4 stun-rods. I've found sectoids and floaters to be highly susceptible to them, and since they take so few TU to apply, they often save my life whenever I turn a wrong corner. Even if they die off because my Alien Containment hasn't finished, you keep the corpses and you can sell those.

EDIT: One of these days I'll have to try playing where if someone dies, I won't load, and keep playing. But it's gonna make me very sad. I'm attached to my soldiers by mission 3.

Ugh, I thought I was done worrying about the game, but then I noticed the third picture on the bottom here.

HP 6/6? Critical hits? This weapon does 5 damage maximum?

Okay first of all, 6 degrees of separation between alive and dead is not much. I have posted many heroic episodes of goodjer survival in the face of enemy plasma fire. Sometimes literally, I'm pretty sure Prozac has been shot in the head multiple times. And except for that one incident with Quintin he survived them all. This can happen in X-com because soldiers can have 25-60 health points. A light wound is losing 25% or so, a heavy wound is losing 50-75% and receiving fatal wounds. This is why even the starting jumpsuit with its 12 frontal armour can be the difference between life and death. Your first upgrade is personal armour with a strength of 50 and it makes a HUGE difference between the ratio of wounds to deaths.

But if you measure hitpoints is such small quantities all of this flies out the window. The best tale of survival you will be able to come up with is surviving with 1 Hitpoint.

The reverse of this is also true. To even display the mechanics running the damage numbers, it means the mechanics have been simplified to a huge degree. There is no complicated formula factoring in random chance, glancing hits, armour protection and the location of the strike. Nope, this rifle does 1-5 damage and the enemy has 6/6 hitpoints.

And critical hits? really? I can't express how blasphemous this is. I could easily see some kind of system based on what part of the body a shot hits like in Jagged Alliance. But that wouldn't work with the hugely simplified health system.

I was unhappy that the new XCOM wouldn't be like the old X-com and I got over that. But if they had to simplify systems this much to make the new game, it makes me worried about what that means for the game as a whole.

Tamren wrote:

I'm pretty sure Prozac has been shot in the head multiple times. And except for that one incident with Quintin he survived them all.

Soooo close to sig worthy...

I shoot to kill, baby.

Apparently DADT hasn't been repealed yet in XCom.

Tamren wrote:

Stuff

Warning: Rage ahead!

Really? The only way you can get a damage range is by thoroughly simplifying the mechanics? You do know that could be a display of base damage, or a rough prediction. It's magically consolitus because they are working to be less opaque than a brick wall?

And cutting a zero off of the HP totals. This is a big deal... why? Oh, because it's different. Because it's just not the same if Prozac gets hit 5 times in the face, taking 1HP damage each because.... I don't know.

And oh no, magical crits! That makes everything so much worse! Even though, you know, Prozac landing a hell of a shot into something's EYE is the same damned thing? No, it's just giving you an idea, presumably based on the weapon and soldier who is wielding it, how likely a lethal shot is.

Look, X-Com was (and remains) one of my favorite games, ever. But let's be honest, the UI was the worst I've ever actually played in, even _with_ the manual, it was as opaque as a lead plate, and several of the vaunted "tactical systems" were either sh*t, or buggy as all hell. ("Shooting down" a UFO in X-com can go burn, for all I care, it was stupid buggy sh*t between me and getting owned by chrysalids.)

But no, any attempt to make the game actually playable to people besides those of us with way too damned much time and stubbornness on our hands, and it's magically dumbed down.

Tkyl, I pity you, I really do. But some of us do have faith in you guys.

Well, the UI wasn't too bad for the era, but it was almost twenty years ago. Looked at with a modern eye, it's dismal, but they didn't really have conventions to draw on, as mice and GUIs were pretty new things to most people, especially on the PC side of things. Apple had a clue, but gamers mostly couldn't afford Macs. At the time, on the PC, that was pretty good.

One potential drawback to shaving a zero off hit points is that you have less granularity... something hits you for either 3 or 4 points out of, say, 10, instead of 35 out of 100. Gives you less variability in your damage results, and you won't get quite the same 'skin of the teeth' saves, where you patch up the wounded guy with 3 hit points left.

I think I prefer the 100 scale for health and damage. You don't really gain anything but complexity by going up another order of magnitude, but the lower order (10) doesn't have fine enough detail. Order 100 is perfect.

Kannon wrote:
Tamren wrote:

Stuff

Warning: Rage ahead!

Really? The only way you can get a damage range is by thoroughly simplifying the mechanics? You do know that could be a display of base damage, or a rough prediction. It's magically consolitus because they are working to be less opaque than a brick wall?

And cutting a zero off of the HP totals. This is a big deal... why? Oh, because it's different. Because it's just not the same if Prozac gets hit 5 times in the face, taking 1HP damage each because.... I don't know.

And oh no, magical crits! That makes everything so much worse! Even though, you know, Prozac landing a hell of a shot into something's EYE is the same damned thing? No, it's just giving you an idea, presumably based on the weapon and soldier who is wielding it, how likely a lethal shot is.

[...]

Tkyl, I pity you, I really do. But some of us do have faith in you guys.

I have to sort of echo this point. I mean, We see 6HP but how do we know the modifiers on the armour or dodge/agility/skills. I mean, we could be talking about the difference between 2nd edition THAC0 and DnD 4th edition*..... we have no idea what's going on in the game mechanics. You can't nitpick them until they are clear and explained.

*I've probably just shown that my only experience of THAC0 was the old computer games and, as such, 2nd edition had already done away with it or something.

Malor wrote:

One potential drawback to shaving a zero off hit points is that you have less granularity... something hits you for either 3 or 4 points out of, say, 10, instead of 35 out of 100. Gives you less variability in your damage results, and you won't get quite the same 'skin of the teeth' saves, where you patch up the wounded guy with 3 hit points left.

I think I prefer the 100 scale for health and damage. You don't really gain anything but complexity by going up another order of magnitude, but the lower order (10) doesn't have fine enough detail. Order 100 is perfect.

Again, to counter your example:

Your marine has 6/6 HP. Your armour and skills allow you to mitigate 2 points of damage from an alien attack (whose ability to hit you and damage is modified by its skill and weapon).... this results in 1.6 damage done to your marine in the enemies' round. This then "regenerates" up from 4.4 to 5HP due to "sci-fi stuff" in your armour, akin to HL2 armour or something. You now have 5HP and not 4 or 4.4.

If you changed this to a scale of 100, it wouldn't affect anything. Of course, we don't know the mechanics.... so.....

Yeah, the indifference to low numbers shows my P&P gaming roots, here. 3e usually started with PCs with single-digit health totals until they got a few levels in them, making them mad squishy and exceptionally fragile. Which... reminds me a lot of early-stage X-com.

Edit: Oh, and 2e used THAC0, 3e ditched it, so you got it right.

Kannon wrote:
Tamren wrote:

Stuff

Warning: Rage ahead!

Really? The only way you can get a damage range is by thoroughly simplifying the mechanics? You do know that could be a display of base damage, or a rough prediction. It's magically consolitus because they are working to be less opaque than a brick wall?

And cutting a zero off of the HP totals. This is a big deal... why? Oh, because it's different. Because it's just not the same if Prozac gets hit 5 times in the face, taking 1HP damage each because.... I don't know.

And oh no, magical crits! That makes everything so much worse! Even though, you know, Prozac landing a hell of a shot into something's EYE is the same damned thing? No, it's just giving you an idea, presumably based on the weapon and soldier who is wielding it, how likely a lethal shot is.

Look, X-Com was (and remains) one of my favorite games, ever. But let's be honest, the UI was the worst I've ever actually played in, even _with_ the manual, it was as opaque as a lead plate, and several of the vaunted "tactical systems" were either sh*t, or buggy as all hell. ("Shooting down" a UFO in X-com can go burn, for all I care, it was stupid buggy sh*t between me and getting owned by chrysalids.)

But no, any attempt to make the game actually playable to people besides those of us with way too damned much time and stubbornness on our hands, and it's magically dumbed down.

Tkyl, I pity you, I really do. But some of us do have faith in you guys.

IMAGE(http://files.sharenator.com/SlowClap_01_Coolest_Way_to_Erase_a_CD-s500x384-165046-535.jpg)

I have no horse in this race, as I've never played the original X-Com, but considering all the great things I've heard about it, it sounds like I'd love it. Unfortunately, while I'm not a graphics snob, I have real difficulty going back 20 years in graphics quality, so I for one am very glad to see that this game is coming out. From the sounds of it, perhaps my ignorance of the original game will work in my favor!

Lars wrote:

I have no horse in this race, as I've never played the original X-Com, but considering all the great things I've heard about it, it sounds like I'd love it. Unfortunately, while I'm not a graphics snob, I have real difficulty going back 20 years in graphics quality, so I for one am very glad to see that this game is coming out. From the sounds of it, perhaps my ignorance of the original game will work in my favor! ;)

I think there's a lot more than graphics blocking people from going back to play that game. It is very much a product of its time on pretty much every level. The idea of a game that captures what X-Com did that no other games have gotten right since, but is designed completely from a contemporary point of view is pretty exciting to me.

Oh wow. Total surprise. Awaiting preorder opportunity.

Duoae wrote:

Your marine has 6/6 HP. Your armour and skills allow you to mitigate 2 points of damage from an alien attack (whose ability to hit you and damage is modified by its skill and weapon).... this results in 1.6 damage done to your marine in the enemies' round. This then "regenerates" up from 4.4 to 5HP due to "sci-fi stuff" in your armour, akin to HL2 armour or something. You now have 5HP and not 4 or 4.4.

If you changed this to a scale of 100, it wouldn't affect anything. Of course, we don't know the mechanics.... so.....

Or, even better, you make it do a roll 100, and if it's over 40, you take 2 points of damage. If it's under or equal to 40, you take one.

It's now all random and hardcoreer.

That level of granularity simply isn't necessary for the sort of stories you describe. If you can honestly get a narrative out of the difference between 6 and 7 hitpoints, let alone 45 and 46 hitpoints, then that's great, but I suspect you'd be in the vast minority. "Uninjured", "Lightly wounded", "Heavily wounded", "Critically wounded"... I'm having a hard time thinking more granular than that, and that's just 5 degrees of difference if you count "Dead" as well.

It could be that the game is being heavily simplified (and I'd be very surprised if it isn't, sadly), but chopping the numbers down a decimal point isn't going to ruin the game. Lets wait until we have hard evidence that they've ruined it before jumping to conclusions from a few screenshots!

If you can honestly get a narrative out of the difference between 6 and 7 hitpoints, let alone 45 and 46 hitpoints, then that's great, but I suspect you'd be in the vast minority.

If you survive by 1 point in 60, that's a lot more interesting than surviving by 1 point in 6.

Redwing wrote:

It could be that the game is being heavily simplified (and I'd be very surprised if it isn't, sadly), but chopping the numbers down a decimal point isn't going to ruin the game. Lets wait until we have hard evidence that they've ruined it before jumping to conclusions from a few screenshots!

I'm not jumping to the conclusion that its ruined. I'm jumping to the conclusion that its different. Exactly how different is what I'm most curious about.

Your example with 5 degrees of difference works in a vacuum. But there are still other issues I didn't mention. For instance, how you could handle fatal wounds with so few HP? When soldiers have 60 degrees of survival you can have uninjured, lightly wounded and so on. And on top of that you can add "will bleed out in 1-10 turns" depending on the number of fatal wounds they have accrued.

With only 6 hitpoints. How could you model health drain? Soldiers would not begin to bleed unless badly wounded, and that would mean losing 25-33% of maximum health. 2-4 hitpoints doesn't leave you much of a pool to drain from. So I'm betting they either nixed this system entirely. Or came up with something else that doesn't tie into to the base pool of hitpoints.

I'm only interested in games which simulate the individual tissues of every single creature.

Tkyl, can you tell us whether it will be possible for our soldiers to enter a fey mood?

Spoiler:

This is a blaster launcher. All craftshumanship is of the highest quality. Is is decorated with chrysalid chitin and sectoid bone. This object menaces with spikes of snakeman leather, Native gold and Tower-cap. On the item is an image of two soldiers in chrysalid chitin. The soldiers are crying.

Malor wrote:
If you can honestly get a narrative out of the difference between 6 and 7 hitpoints, let alone 45 and 46 hitpoints, then that's great, but I suspect you'd be in the vast minority.

If you survive by 1 point in 60, that's a lot more interesting than surviving by 1 point in 6.

Really? How so? It's an abstract system to represent health, 1 out of 6 is pretty much the same as 1 out of 60. From a thematic point of view, it's essentially the same. You're nearly dead. From a game-play point of view it's an vaguely interesting roll of the dice, but at that point you've pulled away from the narrative, it's like getting excited about rolling a 100 on percentile dice.

I tried putting this down in words earlier but didn't succeed. I'm probably hitting the the boundaries of my knowledge here, and also "but this game isn't like that", so I'll see how I do. I think it's worth considering.

This kind of seems similar to me to comparing D&D and what you could call "computer assisted D&D", and real time video games of many genres. There's plenty of games with complex simulations, that don't make them explicit to the player as in real time it would be information overload and it would change the challenge from thinking about the simulation to 'can you out compute a computer for your advantage'. What I see as the really well done games now are ones that communicate as much relevant game information as possible through factors that make sense for the scenario.

Something that throws a great big spanner in the works for my thoughts is that Xcom is turn based, but in the situation I would think it would make less sense to get a detailed physiological diagnostic and know that your soldier is 1/60 or to know how well they can operate.

Also I could see partial bar units.

Really? How so? It's an abstract system to represent health, 1 out of 6 is pretty much the same as 1 out of 60

And it happens every time you take 5 points of damage. Which is going to be all the goddamn time. It's far less interesting if it happens every sortie. There's no nail-biting, skin-of-your-teeth escapes, there's no blind luck like Tamren was talking about ... where your facing absorbed just enough of the blast to keep you among the living.

If you go further, up to the 1000-point scale, it adds nothing, but single-digit hit points don't have enough information in them. It does not allow proper weapon scaling. In an order-100 system, an 8-damage weapon would be a lot more lethal than a 5 damage one, but both would scale to 1 damage in a 10 point system. And you can't have something doing 12 damage at all.... everything from 5 to 14 becomes '1'. Everything from 15 to 24 becomes '2'.

In a system with squaddies that average around six points, you can only have four meaningful damage classes: 6 hits to kill, 3 hits to kill, 2 hits to kill, or instant death.

I mean, think about that a little bit -- all the XCom weapons, from a pistol up to a tactical nuke, would have to fit into just four classes of damage.

It's like they're using severe lossy compression on XCom.... real tactics and scenarios from the first game are being squeezed out of the system just from this one change.

I'm coming down on the simpler side of this coin.

Emergent narratives like the one Tamren related came out of the Xcom mechanics, but such incidents were few and far between. On the whole, a blaster bomb to the face is a death sentence. The few survivor miracle stories are anomalies, and you can simulate anomalies with any numerical system. It neither increases nor decreases play complexity.

I think that the straightforward presentation of mechanics and the simplified presentation (while preserving actual complexity) argues in favor of the game, not against it. When it's easy for gamers to understand your core mechanics, you feel safer layering on more stuff.

An example of a game that had a simpler presentation but was more complex is the comparison between Master of Orion and Master of Orion 2. On its face, MOO2's less granular population mechanics would argue that it is "dumbed down," yet nothing could be further from the truth.

Another way of putting it: say a pistol does 1 damage. There is no way, in this system, to make a weapon that is half again more damaging than a pistol. Either it's exactly the same, or it's at least twice as damaging.

If they use a floating point single-digit number, then it's the same as a 100 point scale anyway, so why not just use integers and two digits? It takes more space to display 1.5 than 15.