ShowUFOsOnMission and other UFO variables

[johnnylump]

Edit: Crossposted with previous; I'll look it over.

 

Ran a game with the following:

 

ShowUFOsOnMission=1

LATE_UFO_CHANCE = 100 ; Chance of Aliens sending out a second UFO in the months after you've defeated the base

EARLY_UFO_CHANCE = 100

UFO_LIMIT = 20

UFO_INTERCEPTION_PCT=100

 

I also turned off all panic, and put up satellites over most of the world for several months, starting in April, but left three countries without coverage.

 

April: 8 airborne UFOs: 1 small scout, 5 large scouts, 2 battleships; 0 landed UFOs

May: 2 airborne UFOs: 1 large scout, 1 abductor; 1 landed UFO (unsure of type).

June: 4 airborne UFOs: 1 small scout, 1 large scout, 2 battleships; 0 landed UFOs

July: 3 airborne UFOs: 1 small scout, 1 large scout, 1 abductor; 1 landed: abductor.

August: 5 airborne UFOs 2 supply, 3 battleships. 2 landed: 1 large scout, 1 unknown.

 

I shot down all the small and large scout UFOs but didn't play out any assaults. I couldn't shoot down the bigger ones -- my research capped out at Phoenix cannon because I wasn't doing ground missions.

 

Here's what I learned

* Near the beginning of the month, a battleship will appear over a country where the aliens intend a terror attack, if they are doing one that month. This battleship does not land, however. Later, another battleship (with a different UFO-X number) will appear and land to conduct the terror attack. This is presumably what ShowUFOsOnMission=1 does. Intercepting the first battleship does not prevent the terror attack (but failing to do so will generate a *third* battleship to shoot down your satellite). I'm not sure whether shooting down the first battleship will prevent the terror attack; presumably shooting down the second does.

 

* Any attempt to intercept an airborne UFO (even if failed) or assault a landed UFO (even if aborted) will prevent a satellite-hunting battleship from appearing. Only if it's ignored completely will it come for your satellites.

 

* I only got abductions in countries without satellite coverage. In April, I left Argentina, Brazil and Australia without satellite coverage. I got an abduction in Brazil alone first, then in Argentina alone. In May, I got a choice between all three in a single abduction event. I *think* a country may only be subject to an abduction once per month (even if there are two abduction incidents).

 

* I never saw an abductor UFO that I could associate with abduction events. I had abductions in April but detected no abductor UFOs. I had abductions in May after intercepting but not shooting down an abductor UFO in Russia (where I had a satellite, but there were not abductions there). (I don't see a way to easily buff interceptor weapons in DefaultGameCore.ini to ensure I'd shoot down an abductor, so I'll have to get a full game going before I can check this). June and after, I had complete satellite coverage. I still saw abductors, but had no abductions.

 

* If you take out the terror mission battleships, and the anti-satellite battleship, the UFO counts by month were 6/3/2/4/4. I wonder if the calculation is something like this:

1) 1 UFO a month, guaranteed.

2) Second UFO is percentage EARLY/LATE UFO chance.

3) Third and thereafter (up to UFO_LIMIT) is somehow random.

 

I'm not sure if the landed UFOs are scripted or UFO_INTERCEPTION_PCT=100 is still less than 100 percent.

 

Cheers,

JL

Edited November 29, 2012 by johnnylump

[Drakous79]

Great info :) especially numbers and preventing satellite-hunting. You raised the cap very well.

 

It was always battleship going after my satellites, punishing me for ignoring the invasion.

 

Also abductions are carried with all craft types (except battleships and overseers?). And if you had only one country to choose from abduction targets, it could be result of shooting down other 2 UFOs.

 

I don't know about landed UFOs. Only it had different number from flyers in my game.

[johnnylump]

 

Also abductions are carried with all craft types (except battleships and overseers?). And if you had only one country to choose from abduction targets, it could be result of shooting down other 2 UFOs.

 

 

You may be right.

 

So:

Does a satellite over a country prevent the aliens from attempting abduction in that country? I think it does.

 

If that's the case, then the only way to shoot down abduction-mission UFOs -- if they really appear -- (and whatever class they are) is if they appear over another country first.

 

It might be 1) any country 2) or any country you have a satellite over. It's not continent-oriented, because I left South America with no satellites and still had a "missing" abduction mission there.

[Drakous79]

Does a satellite over a country prevent the aliens from attempting abduction in that country? I think it does.

 

If that's the case, then the only way to shoot down abduction-mission UFOs -- if they really appear -- (and whatever class they are) is if they appear over another country first.

Yes it is true.

 

Abduction won't happen in a country that:

• is not Council member
  
• left XCOM project,
  
• has satellite coverage,
  
• or is a target of terrror mission.
  

That is for where abductions take place, say they are abduction targets.

 

Haven't found exact code responsible for spawning alien crafts and assigning them flight routes, but what you say applies. I think they can spawn anywhere, but have to fly into satellite range in order to be detected.

[johnnylump]

After a couple of more test runs, I think you're right; abductors come in a variety of forms and appear randomly anywhere in the world. I ran a test with 13 countries with satellites for three months.

 

Abductions were reduced to 1 a month: Two had two countries and one had three countries. Both that had two abductions I shot down a large scout two days prior.

 

(Also learned that three interceptors with Phoenix Cannons can take down an abductor)

 

Second test run had eight countries with satellites for two months, had two full three-country abductions a month.

 

I'm beginning to believe that for the longer, meatier strategic game a lot of modders (including me) go for, the best option might be to make it harder to put satellites up.

[Drakous79]

Full satellite coverage is game over for abductions.

 

Maybe we could jump from End:0xc0 to End:0xd9 in class XGStrategyAi function DetermineBestAbductionTargets() skipping HasSatelliteCoverage condition to have abductions in countries with the coverage.

if(kCountry.LeftXCom())
{
}
// End:0xef
else
{
// End:0xc0
if(kCountry.HasSatelliteCoverage())
{
}
// End:0xef
else
{
	// End:0xd9
	if(IsTerrorTarget(eTargetCountry))
	{
	}
	// End:0xef
	else
	{
		arrPossibleCountries.AddItem(eTargetCountry);
	}
}
}

There are few options to make satellites harder to put up. In DefaultGameCore we can lower uplink capacity (UPLINK_CAPACITY = 2, NEXUS_CAPACITY = 4), lower adjacency bonus (UPLINK_ADJACENCY_BONUS = 1), adjust engineers required for another uplink/nexus (UPLINK_MULTIPLE=10, NEXUS_MULTIPLE=15), make satellites expensive or increase engineers needed (ItemBalance=eItem=eItem_Satellite, iCash=100, iElerium=0, iAlloys=0, iTime=20, iEng=5)).

Edited November 30, 2012 by Drakous79

[Drakous79]

I think it is working. Just got 2 abductions sites with full satellite coverage on 25th December 2015.

 

if(kCountry.LeftXCom())
{
}
// End:0xef
else
{
// This is an implied JumpToken;
goto J0xc0;
kCountry.HasSatelliteCoverage();
// This is an implied JumpToken;
goto J0xef;
J0xc0:
// End:0xd9
if(IsTerrorTarget(eTargetCountry))
{
}
// End:0xef
else
{
	arrPossibleCountries.AddItem(eTargetCountry);
}
}

 

XComStrategyGame.upk, class XGStrategyAI, function DetermineBestAbductionTargets()

86 43 00 00 A9 1F 00 00 00 00 00 00 7F 43 00 00

00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 86 43 00 00 00 00 00 00

C7 07 00 00 C0 FC 00 00 12 01 00 00 CA 00 00 00

0F 00 84 43 00 00 25 07 FD 00 96 00 84 43 00 00

2C 24 16 0F 00 82 43 00 00 38 3D 00 84 43 00 00

0F 00 83 43 00 00 1B 45 06 00 00 00 00 00 00 38

3A 00 82 43 00 00 16 07 76 00 81 19 00 83 43 00

00 0A 00 47 24 00 00 00 1B 3E 14 00 00 00 00 00

00 16 16 06 EF 00 07 9B 00 19 00 83 43 00 00 0A

00 41 24 00 00 00 1B B4 16 00 00 00 00 00 00 16

06 EF 00 07 C0 00 19 00 83 43 00 00 0A 00 74 24

00 00 00 1B 24 11 00 00 00 00 00 00 16 06 EF 00

07 D9 00 1B E1 14 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 82 43 00

00 16 06 EF 00 55 00 85 43 00 00 0A 00 00 82 43

00 00 16 A5 00 84 43 00 00 16 06 0B 00 04 00 85

43 00 00 04 3A 86 43 00 00 53 00 00 00 02 00 02

00 C6 07 00 00 00 00 00 00

 

Change 07 to 06. Search decompressed upk for hex values: 07 C0 00 19 00 83 43 00 00 0A 00 74 24 00 00 00 1B 24 11 00 00 00 00 00 00 16.

[johnnylump]

Great find, there. I haven't cracked any upk files yet; instead, I've reduced the number of satellites each radar and nexus can support, to 1 and 2, respectively (instead of 2 and 4, but I'm keeping the adjacency bonuses). That's also required doing away with the continent-wide panic for abductions; otherwise, it gets out of control with no quick way to resolve it.

[Anbar]

I'm beginning to believe that for the longer, meatier strategic game a lot of modders (including me) go for, the best option might be to make it harder to put satellites up.

 

 

I said that about 2 months ago! :thumbsup:

 

(sorry been AFK working on new models - just catching up on the various mod-stuff)

 

In my modded game (pre 2nd patch) I added in build-times and made satellites more expensive... i considered the 2nd wave option that increased satellite cost for each one launched to be essential, as it off-sets the engineering benefit that drastically reduces build times & costs.

 

So satellites tend to remain around the same costs throughout, or marginally increasing in cost as the two values (2nd wave increased cost, and engineering benefits reducing costs) play-off against one another.

 

playing on impossible/marathon (but with normalised too-hits) I only had to reduce starting panic to zero to find an almost natural balance in the game between increasing panic and satellite availability...but the player has to be almost profligate with interceptors attacking whatever they can *regardless*...otherwise continental panic can cause problems with too-many pulling out of x-com before the player can establish enough satellites.

 

Removal of continental panic for abductions (iirc) worked also, but for some reason many people dont like doing that.

[Just6669]

Default satellite build frenzy is a total game killer for me.

 

Every time I re-start campaign, I promise myself I will try another strategy, but there is no room for it.

Fundings from countries with satellites are so exaggerated, that you have actually no other way to keep financial balance.

 

I will try to fix this for myself by reducing satellite's impact on panic management and funding to minimum, and manage penalties for escaped/ignored UFOs and lost battles, and prices for sellable loot.

I remember having lot of fun in old Xcom, whenever I came back from battle and sold corpses and artifacts to get money for a new Tank or Facility or Fighter.

I like the Idea of alien attacks financing their own doom.

The more attacks they try, the merrier money for won battles you should have. Same with troops quality, selling mutons corpses and sectoids should balance bigger squad loses. Now it is the other way around - if They "forget" to attack, you launch satellite in a high funding country and get more credits. If they do abductions, you have to launch it in a country, where you could not react, because there can be only one Skyranger active on whole Earth (!?).

I do not want to rely my budget on aliens taking a month off, because they are on massive hangover.

 

Honestly, I do not remember If old games were soooo better, or I modded them. I remember hex-editing exec's. It was much easier, when they were much smaller, and almost every variable was an simple integer.

Edited December 2, 2012 by Just6669