Levgre

I'm not positive if EW changes things, but it is very easy with EU to change basic stats with tools provided here. I personally reduced Zombie move speed, attack damage and health, don't think they should be utterly lethal super tanks.

Right now I'm working hard on publishing my first major flash game, so work on this will be sporadic at least for a couple months. This thread will help me develop and track goals until I can start on it, though. If anyone can contribute and wants to join in on the project, that'd be great. Or just give your input, if you wish. Features Soldiers now start with a number of upgrades. The idea is to make soldier deaths not snowball into failure, let soldier deaths be a balanced game aspect, and increase strategy depth, especially from the start of the game (as opposed to rookies who can only shoot or throw grenades). Rifle suppression, Deep Pockets (or just an extra slot) Other possible starting abilities (for all soldiers, or some classes) Rapid Fire, Bullet Swarm. Holo-Targeting, Grenadier, Will to Survive, Snapshot, Squadsight, Smoke Grenade, close combat specialist, Sentinel Whatever level progression they have beyond this (they may simply start at a high level) will occur quickly, i.e. at least one level up per most missions. Trade offs for the extra capabilities include: Soldiers will no longer gain health as they level up, or very little. Advanced tech armor will only add a slight amount of health. Stat progression overall will be low, i.e. +2 to Aim and/or Will per level, depending on class. However starting stats will be higher than current. Medkits will be less effective. If possible, all wounds, at least of higher damage, will inflict 'bleeding' (perhaps just represented as poison). Med kit use will be required each time to simply stop further damage. There will not be insta-healing of wounds in the field, except perhaps as a medic upgrade(1-2 HP) Soldier hirings will be more expensive, perhaps 20$-40$. Soldiers may require upkeep, depending on rank. There will also be more distinguishing between the classes, more weaknesses, as opposed to vanilla where classes can pretty much do everything well. Some classes will simply not be good/viable on some mission/map types. More careful selection of the team makeup will be required. It's possible that some maps will dictate a nearly full assault team, perhaps with 1 heavy and 1 support. Over watch will not be available to all classes, or the penalty will just be much greater for some classes. Snipers will be the over watch specialists, perhaps assault will have oversight at close range. Sniper Class: Will be made weaker in short-distance combat. A penalty with the sniper rifle will be added for a shot within a certain distance. They will not be able to do incredible damage with 2 shots in 1 turn. They won't be the 'nuker' for the team. Their role will be to enable/support the other soldiers, by either suppressing distance targets or taking out pesky enemies. Assault Class: Assault classes will be made the primary class for close range combat. They will have slightly more movespeed, be the only class able to do 2 shots in a turn (at a larger penalty, to make it not the obvious choice even at long range), more will, and more health. Support Class: Support will now be less bonuses in combat, thus truly embracing the 'support' role. They will not get move speed bonus. Heavy Class: The heavy class will be the best at suppression, and doing damage to large targets. Machine guns will no longer be usable after moves, although more sidearm options will be available, such as a sub-machine gun, so they have the choice to forgo a rocket launcher for better close combat. They will have slower movement and lower accuracy compared to other classes, but this is compensated for now having the highest damage potential weapon (at least slightly surpassing sniper rifles). General Gameplay Cover will be at least twice as effective, for both humans and aliens. Proper military strategy will be required to remove an enemy from cover, i.e. flanking (aided by suppression), explosives, and so on. Accuracy against open targets will also be greatly increased, as even from a large distance this is an easy shot for a trained soldier. However, all alien weapons will become more effective at destroying cover (i.e. alien weapons with current environmental damage of 125 will be increased to 175). The soldiers will have to be more mobile, as a result. Human weapons will be slightly more effective at destroying cover, in particular the LMG and Sniper Rifle, to partially simulate their ability in real life to penetrate barriers. Units (soldiers, enemies if possible) will receive stat penalties after taking wounds in battles. Sight range will be increased, perhaps more for aliens than for soldiers. The goal is to eradicate the "move as little as possible as to not trigger enemies" core strategy. Knowledge of the battlefield should be a benefit, not of harm. Soldiers may receive a will/defense bonus per active enemy group (or perhaps +1 or +2 per enemy), to simulate the benefit of knowing where your enemies are, and balance the player's ability to fight larger groups. Aliens will be of a harder difficulty, in general, whether that is higher stats, more per battle, more UFOs, so on. I want the mod to highly accessible for a newer player, but to retain a challenge for veterans, as much as is feasible. SHIVs will be cheaper, and less effective. They will generally be there for taking hits and risky battle positions. An elite soldier can cost a million ore more to train, the purpose of military robotics research is to reduce the cost of injured/killed soldiers. Base Balancing While the majority of this mod is currently focused on battle, there will be some changes to the other aspects of the game. Much of this will link directly into combat, as really that is the part of the game with the most depth and player control. Continent bonus rehauls. Currently none of them really facilitate different strategies. They just save you time and money in a different way, but if you are a skilled player you typically always want to pick the one that saves a good amount of money early, since you can leverage that into later gains. Elite Training All soldiers start at a a higher level, and/or with higher stats. (Benefits a basic, versatile approach to the game) ET Exhibitionism You start the game with Arc Thrower tech (or boost for the research), and an alien containment. Whenever you capture an alien, you receive 10$, perhaps different amounts for different aliens. (promotes a more subtle/precise strategy, where you capture a number of live aliens) Military Tradition You can buy new soldiers at a discounted price, and their maintenance is decreased. Officer school upgrades are cheaper. (allows certain more risky squad makeups, attack strategies, etc.) Will add more as I think of them.

I have played a lot of strategy/FPS, including the granddaddy combination of the genres, the Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six series. Xcom seemed really fun to me at first. Then I got sick of all the lame, unexpected things happening which by and far determined my success. Therefore learning the quirks of the game was much more important sound, consistent strategy. I tried some mods and they did little/nothing to alleviate what I see as the greatest problems in the game. So I have a number of ideas on how to improve the game, I think not just in my own vision, but making it a more fun, in depth, turn based tactical shooter. 1. Basic (real life) soldier skills should be available to all XCom soldiers. These are the foundations of modern squad-based warfare, and without them you get a strategy as close to say Battle Mech, as you do to say real life, or Rainbow Six shooting games. a. All soldiers start with suppressing fire. This is a core foundation to modern squad based combat, one of the main facilitators of flanking/teamwork. Without it, aggression on the battlefield is extremely limited. How is this kept balanced? Have class paths that improve suppressing fire, so it can start lower (still has to be useful from beginning). More reloading, either drop assault rifles down to 2 shots, or have suppressing consume 2 ammo, if possible? Ammo upgrades could therefore be more useful. b. XCom soldiers should be able to hit more than the broad side of a barn. If you have pretty clear shot against an enemy, even if they are far away, it should be a near guarantee to hit. Closer up, it should be a guarantee. How is this kept balanced? Give 'big' penalties on accuracy while shooting at a distance, against an enemy behind cover. Thus while you have better shooting, you are more restrictions on when you can shoot. Have accuracy/movement penalties when a teammate is hit could help. 2. To balance the now arguably more 'super soldiers', increase the cost of new recruits drastically. XCom has things completely backwards. In RL modern warfare, skilled soldiers are much more expensive than most equipment, other than some vehicles/ships etc. The estimated cost of training a Navy Seal is 1 million dollars, or more. Even give them a small upkeep cost, which increases with rank. SHIVs should be cheaper (and less poten) than soldiers. Also give soldiers longer recovery times from injury, as I see in some mods. However, I don't think they should get fatigue between missions, as a realistic amount would be too small to be of impact. Another realistic addition, balancing super soldiers, is have every would require a med pack use to stabiize (stop taking bleeding damage). Medpacks do not heal any damage, as ofc you cannot instantly make wounds disappear on the battlefield. This will make medics even more pivotal, because while everyone could carry packs to heal themselves, you will likely require more packs overall and the 3x is hugely efficient for inventory. Perhaps medic could also get an upgrade where the recipient heals 1 damage? 3. Balance away the willing un-discovery of enemies as a core strategy. Right now, you want to conserve movement/sight because knowledge of your enemy, is your enemy, as supposed to your ally. I'm not sure how you'd offset this in the game mechanics, but here are some ideas. a. Have ai hunker down if they are a certain distance away. Just because you revealed them, doesn't mean they saw you (like with a vison grenade thing).b. Reduce movement speed, so they can't close gaps so quick once they are discovered. Sight then means you could get some extra shots (give Xcom guys superior range?) The movement decrease would also have to apply to Xcom soldiers for balance, although I think with sprinting they have an excess of mobility anyways.c. Some sort of bonus for Xcom soldiers for a more revealed map? Either in will, defense, or marksmanship. The formula could lbe based on how many of the current enemy groups are visible. 4.It would also be nice to give the aliens some capabilities that are actually unique/separate from the human Xcom soldiers. Much of the time they just seem to be similar units in a different skin. However I think I will need to play the game more to get ideas on this, beyond perhaps buffing some of their special abilities. Anyways, I am fully programming flash games right now, so I don't really have time to learn to mod Xcom. However if a group of ppl/anyone want to take up this mantle, I would put time into testing or give as much input as desired towards making XCom a more true-to-life, strategic, and fun tactical shooter.

bump

I'm new to the workshop, but I do have some programming experience with flash. So I feel pretty confident. My goal is to get rid of the 3rd person deaths. I want the player's camera to simply fall to the ground and stay there, perhaps allow rotation. It does not even have to follow the player (like if they died and flew into the air). I just want simply the camera to go down to where the player's body would be, if they fell down and back a bit. So I'm not asking for specific instructions (although I'll take any help), I just want to know what general area I should be looking in. What game assets should I be modding?

Water is actually pretty heavy, 10 pounds per gallon. Not sure what size water bottle we are talking about here...

^ Did you really believe anyone actually thought of this as a legal entitlement issue? Or that such legal technicalities are of any real relevance in the realm of customer satisfaction and sales? You couldn't make a more irrelevant post if you tried. Restaurant customers aren't legally entitled to a fresh and hot meal when they eat there, yet anyone who has basic business sense realizes that businesses who feel they are entitled to have their customers most often suffer/fail. They know that meeting customer expectations (what customers feel entitled to, either because it was promised, or what they expect due to past experiences with that company/competitors alike) is paramount.

The customers of Skyrim are actually entitled to the construction kit, 100%. The reason for this is they promised from the outset that it would be provided. They are also entitled to receive it around the time promised. Bethesda would wholeheartedly agree with this, as they obviously know the basics of operating a business. The service provider is subordinate to the customer, not the other way around (especially in this day and age of pirating and used game vendors). The customer has what they want/need, money. And claiming that "the majority of people who buy the game don't care about mods" is irrelevant, 600k - 1 million+ in sales is still a significant amount, irrelevant of overall sales.

Bandits are career criminals and honestly in medieval times it was conserved lawful and just to kill criminals. I suppose the better route is for the authorities to send out overwhelming force and detain the bandits, but you don't see them doing that... so by killing bandits often you are saving the lives or wealth of their innocent victims..

Guys are the majority who buy the game. Hence most of the audience does not care if there are attractive males, in fact it may make some guys feel a bit insecure (not that they should :P). I suggest a mod.

Start waking up in a inn room in Whiterun (or anywhere else). Have some other guests staying at the hotel, who can start you on various quest lines.

Scary generally requires a feeling of lack of control, of vulnerability, or both. Skyrim in general does not have this at all. Enemy combatants generally can't chase you down. They don't have too much variety in attacks. You can always just open the equipment menu for a "reprieve", and down 10 potions. The lighting is also very accommodating, you won't be surprised by a bear in a dark cave, you will always see them coming (of course they usually are constantly growling). Bandits, marauders and such do not look shifty or angry, they generally look like your typical townsfolk, but with weapons and armor, and have a teasing banter going on as they fight (instead of a sense of hatred/cruelty coming from them). I think a mod could definitely 'fix' many of the things that make Skyrim not a scary game.

Probably.. if you want a quick, poor man's method of doing so, just go to console and type player.setAV Smithing (or whatever the exact skill name is) x (x is the skill level you want). Then just ditch a proportional amount of gold to simulate the purchasing of iron ore and leather straps. It's probably an average of 100-200 gold per skill level.

If you are at least given information as to the general location (which isn't even true some of the time :/) then you can always go old school and write location notes about quests on a piece of paper.

Health should naturally regenerate at a slow rate, based on what condition your body is in (well-fed, not sick), and what the environment is. Not all damage to you is deep gashes, some could just be bruising, shock, etc., and naturally you would be treating your wounds while you rest. So for example, if you rest in the temperate fields near Whiterun, you heal say 10% per day naturally. Less if you are in a swampy area or snowy area. Maybe more in a city(you could go to the temple for in-patient treatment)? Restoration or some sort of medic skill could increase that rate as you treat yourself better. So generally, healing potions/spells would be required for healing at a fast enough rate to actually get things done. But you wouldn't be completely screwed without those remedies, it would just be awkwardly slow.