Armor Overhaul

[SeraphicLaw]

Greetings everyone. New XCOM modder come to toss around ideas...

I need input on my modifications to the way armor effects gameplay -
currently, armor seems to be a sort of 'damage mitigation' with the
health bonuses instead of being 'damage avoidance', which to me makes
more sense, and is probably why the Ghost armor is easily the best in
the game for it's +20 defence. My idea was to severely lower the armors'
HP bonuses and raise the HP/rank that soldiers recieve, making them far
more reliant on levels for reliability and then give all armor defense
bonuses based on their 'type'; now, the 'max possible HP' is lower in my
game than in vanilla - getting hit shouldn't be as easy, but when
troops are, the damage is more severe. In any event, the end goal here
was to create options in the armor sets and make the choice of what to
equip a soldier a bit tougher since no one suit is 'best'.

 

Name Type Stats

Kevlar Light HP +0, Def +10, Move +3

Carapace Medium HP +2, Def +20, Move +0

Skeleton Light HP +2, Def +10, Move +3; Hook

Titan Heavy HP +6, Def +40, Move -3; Sealed

Archangel Medium HP +4, Def +20, Move +0; Flight

Ghost Light HP +4, Def +10, Move +3; Stealth, Hook

Psi Medium HP +4, Def +20, Move +0; PsiDrain, PsiLance

 

Now, I could use help with some problems I've run into:

1. Not sure if the 40 defence on the Titan armor is too much; I am thinking of 30 or lowering the HP bonus.

2. Editting the armor descriptions and armor 'types' to match my
changes ingame; this is really just a 'polish' step, but I cant figure
out where to edit this information, or how armor effects skills like
Extra Conditioning.

3. I initially wanted Psi armor to have Psi Drain and the Ethereals'
ability to block and reflect damage, but I've no idea how that mechanic
works - it doesn't seem to be tied to an ability at all, so it might be
too much work to bother with, so I settled with the Psi Lance as an
additional offensive power, as the Psi armor is rather lackluster in
comparison to the other sets.

Edited March 2, 2013 by SeraphicLaw

[Yzaxtol]

defence 40 is way too much, if in heavy cover you'd give -80% chance to hit you along with smoke would be -100% Defence is actually one of the most powerful stats in the game. treat it with respect.

 

Edit: Extra Conditoining is: +1 hp Kevlar, +2 hp Carapace/Skeleton, +4hp Titan+ To make it truly work, you'll probably have to go and modify most of the aliens stats aswell to make sure the extra defence doesn't over-power their AIM values completely.

 

The system could work but it'll probably need an overhaul on whole aim system aswell as defense and aim are pretty much the same.

Edited March 2, 2013 by Yzaxtol

[SeraphicLaw]

Yzaxtol, on 02 Mar 2013 - 04:56, said:

defence 40 is way too much, if in heavy cover you'd give -80% chance to hit you along with smoke would be -100% Defence is actually one of the most powerful stats in the game. treat it with respect.

 

Edit: Extra Conditoining is: +1 hp Kevlar, +2 hp Carapace/Skeleton, +4hp Titan+ To make it truly work, you'll probably have to go and modify most of the aliens stats aswell to make sure the extra defence doesn't over-power their AIM values completely.

 

The system could work but it'll probably need an overhaul on whole aim system aswell as defense and aim are pretty much the same.

I was considering making it a 5%/10%/20% bonus, but even then it just seemed too minimal - the idea is to not get hit often, but you get trashed when you do since overall my troops have about 2/3 the health of a vanilla game and I know late-game units will easily one shot my troops with any critical hit, not to mention defense does nothing for grenades.

I've considered removing the HP bonuses entirely to assist with this, though for the moment I've lowered Titan's to +4 in line with the rest of the 'endgame' sets. [EDIT]: I think you are right, though - I'll lower it to 30 and do my testing from there; I DO want the armor to be substantially effective at avoiding damage, so I want the value to be high - making the unit in it 'invulnerable' while he is in smoke isn't really game breaking in my opinion as that is a limited use buff and I feel the movement penalty is equally substantial.

 

My thinking with the Titan armor was that the movement penalty would balance it out; troops can only naturally move 6 spaces, so the Titan armor will half that, making anyone wearing it extremely slugish - just parking them out in the open would need to be just as viable as trying to move from cover to cover as Id usually do. Of course, the armor's primary purpose in my game would go in-line with moving the 'Sprinter' skill to the Assualt class on the 'shotgun' side - both would cancel each other out but due to how close shotguns tend to get they are so often flanked that I hardly ever see any who survive to get ranks and have eschewed shotgun use altogether for this reason - making the Titan armor shine on this build would increase their survivability without giving any huge combat benefits, and anyone else using it just move so slow that even moving to avoid a flanking attempt would be quite difficult (not that any clever player should be getting flanked by the AI).

 

Again, I have yet to really test it out and see since I've restarted my game and haven't reached the Titan armor yet but I have been happy with the changes made to the other armor sets so far; I've taken less hits overall, but the game has still managed to flank any overextended troops (done intentionally) and hits I have taken either outright kill my troops or very nearly kill them.

Edited March 3, 2013 by SeraphicLaw

[SeraphicLaw]

Of course, this only changes incoming fire - I havent modified weapons or enemy stats at all quite yet, but I do think Berserkers and such who ignore cover altogether could use better innate armor values.

 

[EDIT]: I'm a little queasy on modifying too much else beyond maybe giving Berserkers +20 and Mutons and Chrissalids +10 defense as the changes I've made balance themselves out with the HP debuff - I'd have to do the same to the aliens and they don't really need it; I was simply upset with the way armor worked overall in the game; first off, the game has very few 'side-grades'; Ghost armor is easily the best in the game and the only reason to use anything else is to train new Squaddies late game for the HP bonuses. But my other gripe with armor is the whole 'damage mitigation' mechanic: since armor only gives your unit more HP and doesnt differentiate between the 'armor's HP' and the soldier's, a soldier wearing titan armor who takes, say, 6 damage technically shouldnt be hurt at all - all of the damage was to the armor since it didnt exceed 10 - but the soldier will still be out of commission for a week or more because he took damage. If it differentiated, Id be happy with the system as is and only look to 'level' the last 4 sets so they were all viable endgame.

Edited March 3, 2013 by SeraphicLaw

[Yzaxtol]

Armour does work like that, only when the troop loses all the hp granted by armour does he become wounded.

 

I've just tested 6 dmg against 7hp Carapace and 5hp skeleton suit. Only the skeleton suit users were wounded.

[SeraphicLaw]

That is odd; I've had units take a single damage in my games [prior to modding] who were out for a week. Are you sure?

 

Honestly, I'd go back and test it to be sure but while that system 'works', Ive already done all the changes and do prefer armor that 'turns away' damage rather than 'absorbs' it - I have kept some HP increases, but they are minimal. The system just makes more sense overall because that is really what armor is designed to do, it isn't meant to just absorb a limited amount of damage.

 

[EDIT]: The real fly in the ointment will be explosives, really - since they ignore armor altogether the loss of HP overall makes grenades far more threatening.

Edited March 3, 2013 by SeraphicLaw