Tanks

[Jonaleth Irenicus]

There's this awesome weapons platform sitting there, and on paper, it looks like it has a high potential of being useful, until you realise that the tank will die if the road beneath it is destroy (and that can be accomplished by the splash damage of an incoming missle).

 

I am wondering, why didn't anybody try to fix this with a patch or game enhancing mod? Heck, you could even add new tank weapons based on alien weapons research (or even better, new X-Com engineered tanks!!!).

 

The tank is bound to the road, so it should have advantages in other areas that flying vehicles don't have (powerful weapons? faster speed?). The game AI for road vehicles already sux (there was this one game where my newly bought tank could not make it to my base without me controlling it), couple that with the road vulnerability and you have the weakest vehicle in the game. Such a shame...

[Cpl. Facehugger]

An Xcom hovertank would be nice. Not hover like say an annhilator, but hover like "I can't be killed by the road collapsing"

[Jonaleth Irenicus]

If you could stop a vehicle from doing vertical movements (so no climbing directly up), and force it to fly at the lowest altitude possible, you could have a nice hovertank. It would not only be immune to road collapse, it would also be able to leave the road, but not go over buildings, thus making a perfect hover tank.

 

BTW, I've never seen an Overspawn, but I know it's a land walking mammoth that is deployed to ruin the city. I never heard the Overspawn getting killed because the road beneath it is destroyed (I don't think it uses the road for that matter), so a similar AI could be copied, no?

[Cpl. Facehugger]

The overspawn can go anywhere it wants.

[Jonaleth Irenicus]

Like a flying vehicle? Or like a vehicle bound to the ground?

 

And if it wants to go through buildings, does it simply destroy them?

[Cpl. Facehugger]

The overspawn walks. It destroyes whatever is in its way. Although it will eventually get killed by falling debris. (From the buildings it destroys)

[j'ordos]

And Mega Prime vehicles have to stay on the road, they work on antigravity or something like it, with the engines repulsing themselves from a material in the road, making it impossible for those vehicles to fly if the road's gone.

 

This, however, makes no sense for the tank, since it clearly has caterpillars

[Cpl. Facehugger]

So...Perhaps some intrepid modder could modify the tank to use the Overspawn characteristics? So it could go off roading?

[j'ordos]

+ smashing through buildings? I'd love it, I'd buy several at once and let them loose on the Cult of Sirius

[Cpl. Facehugger]

Eh, I'm not as concerned about the building smashing part. I would rather have the off road part.

[j'ordos]

I know, but it would be a neat extra

[Deathskull]

but it would kill itself with falling debris!

[Deathskull]

+ smashing through buildings? I'd love it, I'd buy several at once and let them loose on the Cult of Sirius

imagine the possibilites...

[[NKF]]

There are only a few problems with using the overspud as a tank. I used XED to give me control of an overspawn and had the following observations:

 

1. When idle, it moves about randomly and destroys anything in its path, probably damaging itself in the process (about the only way to have it plough through a building- but if using manual control, you can have it charge through a building and instantaneously appear out the other side with a whole row of destruction behind it -- I think it used the 'swap lanes' button or reverse direction button... this is probably just unexpected behaviour - I wouldn't trust it). (There is one major advantage, however. These attacks are always attributed to the 'Alien's' and not the group currently controlling the unit. Ha! so you can run down anything you like and not get attacked. Pity about the damage though...)

 

2. It cannot go into the parking area of a building (you cannot return it to a base). This is perhaps its most limiting factor. There's no way to park it to customise and repair it.

 

Pity... you could fit three weapons on an overspawn. It has the same size weapon hardpoints as the annihilator. Horribly slow though.

 

- NKF

[Jonaleth Irenicus]

Hmm. I see why modding a tank like an overspawn would be a problem then. We certainly wouldn't want a tank plowing through buildings now, do we?

 

As for not being able to return to base... Well, to tell the truth, if it didn't run out of ammo and fuel, I wouldn't mind this that much. I mean, the current tank AI already has problems with returning to base as it is (one tile of road somewhere close to your base gets destroyed and the tank will not be able to find it's way back to base from that direction).

 

Damn, it's so bad nearly all of the X-Com games were "premature". Who knows what we woul be playing if we had a completed X-Com Apocalypse in our hands...

[j'ordos]

A pretty good fix for the vehicles would be to make roads invulnerable(almost, perhaps only heavy missiles/heavy disruptor beam), but i haven't found anything yet, and don't really know where to look... (UFO2P.EXE, CITYMAP1-5(.BLK), CITYMAP.DAT, one of those I think)

 

edit : you can't just create a new ground vehicle (not to mention making it manufacturable), but you could replace the dimension probe for example and make it a ground vehicle (not hard to do). Only thing is, there's not much to improve upon previous vehicles, besides speed... And there are no improved ground weapons (maybe you can replace some no longer used vehicle weapons? But even then you would need to be able to R&D them...)

Edited March 12, 2004 by j'ordos

[Guest Azrael]

Moved to X-Com 3: general

[Tain]

What would REALLY make the tank useful is that if it could be reduced in size, and used in tactical, kind of like the old hovertanks and coelecanths used to be. As they exist currently they really are pretty useless. (especially as noted above they are dependant on the roads)

[The Master Maniac]

I thought I was the only one who had a problem with this. The standard AFV would totally rock, if not for the fact that road-based vehicles are so incredibly limited in scope (ie, must constantly keep moving, are totally annihilated if so much as a tiny section of the road goes out--which happens a lot). I absolutely hated it when my super-beefy, brand-new tank started to level one of the Cult's buildings with its shiny plasma cannon...then, just seconds afterwards, got crushed by the collapsing wreckage when it decided to roll right on down into its parking bay.

 

Any kind of AI-based fix for just the road vehicles would be immeasurably awesome. I don't know--maybe, as it was eariler suggested, there's some way to give road-based vehicles slightly restricted "hovering" vehicle properties, like allowing a turbo bike to "hover" off the road like its airborne cousin, but not be able to increase its altitude. Needless to say, this would probably take a lot of time and patience, so I'm not sure we'll see that happening anytime soon, but it would be something interesting to look forward to.

 

edit--J'ordos put forth an excellent suggestion: simply make the roads invincible! Would there be any possible way to do that? It'd be an improvement, at least.

Edited August 31, 2004 by The Master Maniac

[[Blehm 98]]

hmm, also, if you had an overspawn under your control, would it be attacked by megapol and such?(also, what if i use midnight to make an overspawn under my control?)

[[NKF]]

Ah, I can answer that question easily. Used XED to swap it's alliance and pow, instant X-Com overspawn.

 

1. The overspawn will behave like a X-Com ground unit (heck, it even had weapon hardpoints and equipment space that rivals the annihilator! Empty though). However, it's NOT a road vehicle and does not follow the roads. It can walk anywhere and is therefore cannot be blown to bits when the road is blown up from underneath it. This also means it cannot return to any of your bases. The ground movement controls act a bit weird and sometimes charge the overspawn right through an entire building block instantly (it comes out unharmed on the other side). At other times they can cause the game to crash.

 

2. No ships except from rival organisation will actively attack it.

 

3. From time to time, the overspawn will move randomly all by itself. If it walks into a building, it damages it (and itself). This attack however has one minor difference. It counts as an alien attack. The ships that come out to attack, unless hostile, seem to ignore the overspawn because (at this time) it's not an alien owned unit.

 

If you could send it back to base to get healed up and send it out whenever you wanted.... Three rumble cannons... Shields!

 

If only your tanks were like that.

 

- NKF

[j'ordos]

If only your tanks were like that.

 

- NKF

 

well, if you open up UFO2P.exe with a hex editor, and go to address 18AC4E, change that to 02, it turns the tank into an overspawn . But it does not have a graphic (you just see buildings suddenly collapse), and again can't be sent back to base...

Edited August 31, 2004 by j'ordos

[The Master Maniac]

So they more or less built the Overspawn on the tank, or vice versa? Strange...

[j'ordos]

So they more or less built the Overspawn on the tank, or vice versa? Strange...

no, no, every craft has such a variable, 00 means ground control, 01 means flying and 02 means overspawn. I just took the tank, because of what NKF said.

Edited September 4, 2004 by j'ordos

[The Master Maniac]

Oh. Well, I know absolutely jack about the tech stuff, you know.

[Cpl. Facehugger]

So we could presumeably set the tank up to hover/fly? That would alleviate the 'tanks are virtually useless due to crappy road' problem...

[Tain]

Interesting idea Facehugger, but i think the tank only comes with the road vehicle animations, it wouldn't have the extra animations necessary to be able to fly. I suppose you could make it fly anyway, but it sure would look weird.. Edited September 1, 2004 by Tain

[j'ordos]

Interesting idea Facehugger, but i think the tank only comes with the road vehicle animations, it wouldn't have the extra animations necessary to be able to fly.  I suppose you could make it fly anyway, but it sure would look weird..

That is correct, in fact, each movement ability thingy, has its own graphic file, if you would make the tank flying it would probably look like a few UFOs depending on which direction it is facing (which frame is currently used). besides, making the tank fly is not really the answer to making GROUND vehicles useful

[The Master Maniac]

Well, we're not trying to make them fly, per se, just rather cheat a little bit by letting them hover. Er, okay, maybe you're right. Well, would there be any way to make them independant from the road, yet they must stick to the road at the same time?

[Tain]

That would depend on how the roads actually work. I suppose that if there is a value that says road = driveable, grass != driveable or something along those lines, you could simply set a bunch of other tiles to = driveable. The problem with that is now ALL ground vehicles would be capable of offroading. The trick would be finding a way to distinguish the tank from everything else. Edited September 1, 2004 by Tain

[j'ordos]

That would depend on how the roads actually work. I suppose that if there is a value that says road = driveable, grass != driveable or something along those lines, you could simply set a bunch of other tiles to = driveable.  The problem with that is now ALL ground vehicles would be capable of offroading.  The trick would be finding a way to distinguish the tank from everything else.

thing is, it is probably around the same place as the armor value for each tile, and I believe it is easier to alter that one instead.

[Tain]

Wait a second, i just had an idea. The overspawn! It can move offroad and on road, wherever it wants, but it cannot fly? I think we should start our search with it. It can do what we want the tank to do already! This aspiring Godzilla wannabe may just hold the answer. Edited September 1, 2004 by Tain

[j'ordos]

Wait a second, i just had an idea. The overspawn! It can move offroad and on road, wherever it wants, but it cannot fly? I think we should start our search with it.  It can do what we want the tank to do already!  This aspiring Godzilla wannabe may just hold the answer.

as already said before, overspawn has a seperate movement ability, you'll get an overspawn without the graphic, that is more or less under your control. Not the answer, unless you'd like the tank to smash every building in it's path

[Tsereve]

I wouldn't mind that. . .isn't there a skyscraper in your game that you've always wanted to destroy from the bottom up , but never worked up the courage to do so? Answer: the Spawntank!

[Exo2000]

IMO, the Griffon needs like a Disruptor Turret or something. Otherwise they're only good for terrorizing the hapless CoS.

 

I'd like to see the X-COM vehicles (Wolfhound APC in particular) do offroading because it's a much more reliable way of transporting Agents. The dangers of a Valk are numerous because, to carry a good sized squad it needs to forego shielding for cargo and passenger space, and a Hawk is too clunky IMO, I prefer the Valk for troop deployments. I do have an Alien Transporter, which I used Midnight to obtain. The alien drops are scripted, they do not naturally come with any passengers. "Passengers 0" kinda gives it away.

[Tsereve]

IMO, the Griffon needs like a Disruptor Turret or something. Otherwise they're only good for terrorizing the hapless CoS.

 

Don't say it like it's a bad thing. Say it with joy!

 

Just think of what you could do with an geoscape&tactical Apoc hovertank w/ Dimension missiles. . .or devastator.

[Exo2000]

Or both. >

 

Mwhahaha.

[[NKF]]

The tank doesn't really need an advanced cannon. It's already got one of the most brutal weapons in the game, the rumble cannon.

 

Sadly, the AI controlling your vehicles doesn't know how to use it properly and it suffers from one major flaw. It's too short ranged. And the one major flaw with the tank is that it can't get close to the UFOs because of its incredibly high mortality rate and it is restricted to the roads. Basically, the rumble cannon's full potential is wasted.

 

Those with XED (and can get it to work) might want to try using the vehicle editor to arm an annihilator with three of them and then try taking on the alien dimension solo. You must use manual control to get the best out of it. Or, vent your frustration on the city. I can tell you from first hand experience that it's way too much fun flying about the city spraying hundreds of high explosive balls of death and destruction at my enemies.

 

- NKF

Edited September 4, 2004 by NKF

[Exo2000]

So not only does the Rumble Cannon have infinite ammo but it's one of the most powerful weapons in the "geoscape"?

[j'ordos]

So not only does the Rumble Cannon have infinite ammo but it's one of the most powerful weapons in the "geoscape"?

it's not the most powerful, but it does have high damage, coupled with infinite ammo and a high fire rate, you've got one BFG

 

exo2000 : according to what I see, the alien transporter can carry 3072 passengers

 

edit : I found something interesting, if you go to address 18AC74, you should have a value '7A', this appears to be the craft's base chance to get hit. (higher=less chance to hit, ECM?). Now, if you set that to '00', the weaponry will have a much higher chance of hitting the tank, instead of the road! I tested this, attacked a police station, going against : a hawk air warrior, a valkyrie interceptor and two police hovercars. Not a single square of road was destroyed! One did get damaged in the end, by one of the hovercars (probably that inaccurate 40mm cannon), so it's not fool-proof, but it's a lot better. The test was done with an altered 360 degrees firing arc of the rumble cannon tho, so the enemy craft got downed alot faster than usual. Also tried against a phoenix hovercar and a hoverbike, same result, no roads destroyed.

 

This would only be a good fix for the tank, other ground vehicles do not have enough armor to sustain constant hits. Well, perhaps the APC...

 

edit 2 : well, this tank is pretty much the ultimate weapon for destroying mega-prime, take that overspawn . I let it move from one corner to the other, whil randomly attacking buildings in my path, carefully not attacking vehicles, and still the tank survived, although it got 'lightly damaged', because of the missiles . I don't know, however, how it works against UFOs...

Edited September 5, 2004 by j'ordos

[Exo2000]

Odd. Without Passenger Modules, the Alien Transporter says "Passengers: 0" for me. Can it actually transport people regardless of that passengers thing?

 

Interesting thing about the ECM thing.. that would explain why Hoverbikes are one of the best weapons against Annihilators

 

I've got such a large fleet in one base and I only have 2 launch tubes. Perhaps I should "store" the Annihilators in surrounding buildings? And anything else with energy weapons that aren't plasma. I actually have about 5-6 Valks that have double Bolter 9000's. I prefer not to use missile weaps on the cityscape as they tend to get launched from a stupid angle and hit a building. (ie, the missile is fired when your ship is facing AWAY from the enemy)

[j'ordos]

Odd. Without Passenger Modules, the Alien Transporter says "Passengers: 0" for me. Can it actually transport people regardless of that passengers thing?

 

Interesting thing about the ECM thing.. that would explain why Hoverbikes are one of the best weapons against Annihilators

 

I've got such a large fleet in one base and I only have 2 launch tubes. Perhaps I should "store" the Annihilators in surrounding buildings? And anything else with energy weapons that aren't plasma. I actually have about 5-6 Valks that have double Bolter 9000's. I prefer not to use missile weaps on the cityscape as they tend to get launched from a stupid angle and hit a building. (ie, the missile is fired when your ship is facing AWAY from the enemy)

 

well, ingame it probably says that, haven't tested yet, but according to the hex editor, it is 3072

 

only unit with as much 'ECM' as the hoverbike, is the blazer turbo bike .

 

Well, it could be interesting to move ships somewhere else, but you will always have to make them move there after battle, and back to base when damaged, for repairs. And with annihilators you probably don't need that fast response anymore

Edited September 5, 2004 by j'ordos

[Exo2000]

You do when the only buildings the Aliens attack are the Slums and some Apartment block halfway across the city that you can't buy any bases near!

[[Blehm 98]]

but they are probably trigger scripted. If you could fool the game into thinking the Transporter is alien, then it would be attacked by different organizations, and would probably drop aliens and contaminate buildings if you fly over them