UFO: Extraterrestrials is a futuristic real-time/turn-based strategy blend set on the fictional planet of Esperanza in 2025. Having made a bloody first contact with a strange form of life from another planet, the player is thrust into the tough position of leading the defense of this isolated planet against the never-ending assault of these hostile invaders
It's too hard. I got past the robots, barely. Then I ran into the Fire Bastards.
Thats my name for them. I don't know what their real name is, because no matter how cautious or careful my tactics, I'll lose my whole squad every time. And hence, I'll never research it.
So, I'm stymied. And it's just to frustrating now to proceed.
There needs to be a level below easy in this game.
Looking at your avatar and signature, and then reading what you said, I totally zonked out and couldn't figure out what you were talking about. I had been in the Forge of Freedom section not 1 minute prior.
In my latest (vanilla) game I've researched everything I can until the battleships start coming. I've got and had phantoms and their cohorts for awhile now. Goes to prove to don't over research.
In this game I've researched particle weapons but money has been so extremely tight I've been making do with lesser weapons. I do however have some chemoguns that I carry in my backpacks. One shot will take out most everything except the phantoms which about half the time it takes two.
It takes time to maneuver around to get to take those shots tho.
I haven't even equipped most of my fighters (craft)with anything past the plasma stage as I can't afford to upgrade. But they're good enough for fighters and scouts and if an occasional cruiser wanders in the center of my empire I might go after it. Battlecruisers I leave alone until they land.
I've just landed to take on a supply battlecruiser before taking out an alien base. I should have enough money to make particle rifles and ammo after that.
BTW because of money restraints I'm only using the second stage troop carrier.
As for sight range, I don't consider it a cheat, I just don't think there is anyone that can convince me that we have worst sighting target quipment in the future than we do today.
While yeah, it obviously doesn't reflect reality (very few games do), it's still a cheat. A big part of the game is spotting, and using scout units (either tanks or fast soldiers) to find the aliens before they find you. Giving a larger view is cheating, even if it is more realistic.
Why that ?? You just have to also increase Alien sight range to rebalance game. I just can't play with LOS at 30 m in full daylight !! [:@] Plus it makes for a grenade brawl, there's no point in having long range weapons if you can just see 30m... But oh no you can use them from afar, as long as someone has a LOS !! [X(] And *that's* real cheating !!!
So I prefer to just increase sight range to 20 squares or so.[:'(]
I have yet to try to shoot down a battleship. And I've shot down few battlecruisers.
As Erik said let them do their thing.
I usually attack them on the ground however and it takes patience and knowing what aliens are vulnerable to what weapons. Some aren't vulnerable to any, you just have to keep hitting them. And keep your troops spread out.
I set my troops up in a "line of battle" and send in an APC to look for aliens and then run like hell back. Meanwhile my "line of battle" are all taking pot shots at the badies.
Yeah, but this indicates the robot era is upon me, no? I'll see robots now in ships smaller than BCs, maybe? Terror missions? Base assaults?
This is not good. [:(]
I haven't even gotten that far and my dudes die [X(] I am not so good at these games sometimes (sigh). I have learned some good tips from this thread. Got to check my research when I get home.
One trick is to hide in a building. Have a spotter outside. When they see an alien close by your trooper in the building have him fire a shot into the wall(opening it up), step up, and use autofire on the nearby alien.
Also be aware that the stun gas has no effect on your own men so you can use it on an alien right next to you.
Jim, researching Plasma Cannon triggers Era 2, which means destroyers. So my advice is not to research Plasma Cannon until you have a squad of 8 (or 10 with Thunder) equipped with Beekeeper armour, mind shields, and this is the important part - a mixture of Heavy Lasers and Flamethrowers. Laser Rifles are VERY POOR against Destroyers.
Something else must trigger them, however, because I'm playing on right now...I'm up to ONLY Plasma RIFLE now in fact...and I'm still seeing Destroyers on my missions. And those floating shuriken too. AND not just on battlecruisers either, I just ran into some on a shot down fighter.
That's why I'm in the mess I'm in right now, I adopted a "slow research strategy, carefully avoiding Plasma Cannon...and now the strategy has backfired on me. BIG TIME. The robots came anyways. So, now I'm caught in a situation where I'm forced to fight era 2 monsters with era 1 technology.
So, I unceremoniously dumped the "slow research" strategy, bought more labs, and finally clawed my way partly up the plasma tree...and I'm BARELY hanging on. I can just manange to fill my Thunder with 6 troops and a basic tank...invariably, 10-12 guys are in the hospital at all times now.
I'm not sure if I can hang on...I'm having to let terror missions occur and landed cruisers go unexplored...if I see a robot in a mission, offiical policy is to hop back on the Thunder with everyone left alive and Abort, because I know I can't handle them. Eventually I fear this will impact my funding...and I'll lose this game.
Even the lesser aliens are shooting Ions at me now, dropping my guys with one hit.
The "slow research" strategy is a very ill-advised one IME.
Well, you have to tailor the tech research with the time lvl of the game. After a certain time, Destroyers shho up, anyway. The trick is to have almost everyone outfitted with a second weapon = Rocket Launchers or Flamethrowers. I usually have at least 6-8 with RL and IGNITABLE rockets.
Still, it is a tough fight. Even on normal the Destroyers take like 10 hits from lasers and rifles. Thing is, as long as you do not have to face many at a time, you can really rack up the experience points! Each hit, even if it does not kill the target, gives XP.
Also, if you go to every mission site, the game will just give you more missions. The STRATEGY is picking which to go on. When I first meet the machines, and have the tech level like you do, I usually skip scouts since they inevitably end up with 1-3 wounded. Not worth the trouble.
Thing is, no matter what you do, you will always be in this situation. If you tech too fast and get the weapons that can kill the mechies, well, then the fire-spitters show up and you're right where you where ... needing to tech to get even better weapons.
Even when you get Era 3 weapons, Era 4 stuff will show up, and again your weapons are out of date.
The tactic is to be able to do so-so, win your missions you do go on, save troopers by skipping some missions (so you can respond to a base recovery mission if they invade one of your bases), and win with semi-lower tech.
Damn but I hate those flamethrower mechs! I have more casualties from them than all the Phantoms I've ever faced.
Just finished my second game. Should I go for three?
as a side note, a new game Era is not necessarily triggered by research. once battlecruisers show up, you are in Era 2, whether you like it or not. battleships trigger Era 3.
just as a fyi.
Those Inquistors are very sneaky Critters and take a lot of patience to get em.I've used tanks to draw them out and then long range shoot em.But if u don't have a tank move slowly--as in a few steps at a time and make sure that u have at least 3 people that will be able to snipe em when they show thier Blue eyed face to u.Terrain is very useful against them----hills and trees.But main thing is to draw them to u ---try tossing a grenade out into nowhere and then wait for them to come.They are very tough to find inside of buildings--as in taking back a base---and will sneak up behin u or lay in wait so try to set your men so that u can see the end of a hall or a doorway and shoot em as they come in.like i said --sneaky bu####rs---have to outsmart em.
Glad to see that u did'nt shelf the game, cuz this is just a blast----Have played through on easy{vanilla} and am now going into April on Hard{Vanilla with patch} and can't wait to see what those nasty little bug heads have in stor e for me now.
Will probably try a Mod game after this but never have been much for using mods.Will have to see how i do on Hard and go from there.Luck to u mate---Hang in there.
Yep, I finally figured them guys out, and its exactly like you say...use a tank for scouting, spot them, retreat your tank, drawing them into the open, then snipe them to death with long range fire from the troopers as clear cross-map shots develop. Thanks to the tank, all your guys can see them...they can only see your tank (which is expendable).
The strategy works well on other alien critters as well.
If you lose your tank early, you can always pile back in the shuttle and abort if the rest of the mission is too hard after that (ie, 15 preachers remaining).
Yeah it a bag when your tanks goes down early,but fortunately haven't had to abort a mission yet.The DesertRats lost one coming right off the ship once but since it was only Hullucinoids and Larva we slogged on and came through with only light injuries.What a fight though---it was a cruiser and there was only four of us. Heh --top guns and mean as u can get and hungry for more.
