Grouping Weapons Research

[54x]

Something that kinda bugged me about UFO was that research on the principle behind a weapon wasn't seperated from research on the deliverf mechanic- so researching heavy plasma took the same amount of time whether you'd already researced another plasma weapon or not.

 

I think it would be quite a good idea to seperate the research tree as follows:

 

                 /- Laser Pistol -\
Laser Weapons -<-- Laser Rifle  -->-Laser Cannon --- Laser Defences
                \- Heavy Laser  -/
                 /- Plasma Pistol -\
Plasma Weapons -<-- Plasma Rifle  -->- Plasma Cannon --- Plasma Defences
                 \- Heavy Plasma  -/

 

This means that once you researched the principle of the weapon itself, (which can be done as soon as you have any plasma-related items in your inventory) you can then spend a shorter amount of time researching ways to apply the weapon's mechanics to a pistol, rifle, or heavy cannon. Then once you've got some experience with that, you can scale up the weapon. Basically what this means is that you have a much bigger delay on aqquiring your FIRST alien gun, although once you've got one, the other two are likely to follow quickly. In UFO, I believe laser weapons already work this way.

 

Another side-benefit is that we could potentially require you to understand the workings of one type of weapon before moving on to another, allowing the X-net to reference previous weaponry.

Edited October 11, 2004 by 54x

[Paladin]

Good idea, and I might add that BUILDING plasma weapons should be harder that simply using them...

 

Oh, and since the XCOM enginers can build such advanced weaonry, how come they can'T build simple terran amno??

[Qonfused]

they could, but i still think it's easyr to just buy it, never bugged me that you couldnt build those things.

 

I think that the soldiers allso should be able to use unresearched wepons, its point and klick. you could make it hard for them to use it effective though.

Edited October 12, 2004 by Qonfused

[Snakeman]

"I like to keep this around for close encounters (or something like that)" - Hicks as he whips out his shotgun

 

"I heard that" - Frost, before he got waxed in Aliens

 

I think we could have one or two more Earth type gun weapons added, but I believe the key to the versatility of said weapons will probably lay with its snap/autofire % and its ammo type. I don't mind buying my ammo either, but there's something to be said for having our scientists able to add to their existing knowledge and keep them working longer.

 

I think if nothing else it would increase the time with which we keep scientists employed. After all, one of the big hurtles in managing bases was its maintenance, but also the fees for everyone residing there. When all is said and done, I think with X-COM we could round up our research a little too quickly. I say, keep 'em around a while longer, have them come up with the odd bit of extra tech, be it alien or human, and force us to budget for things a while longer as well. These techs by the way don't have to come fast mind you, and could be spread out after you've done all your other primary stuff for the game.

[Tuoppi]

IMO the research needs to be a lot slower, not for realism reasons, but for gameplay. I'd like to have a feeling that scientists are truly creating something complex, not just take a plasmagun, turn it around a bit and make it bigger. Creating new craft concepts from scratch should take more like a year instead of few weeks. Plasma rifle a few months and small research like autopsies are completed in few days. Thus you would have to use low tech for longer while, and really think what you research. Alien invaders seemed a bit too weak, as humans could find out all their secrets in few years and beat the krap out of them all the time. I'd really like to feel overwhelmed technologically, not numerically.

 

Also, research speed should not be linear to number of scientists, 20 scientists would find out laser in approx 0,6 x time of 10 scientists. When having large groups the effect would increase to something like- 200 scis over 100 -> time is 0,8 x.

[Qonfused]

Also, research speed should not be linear to number of scientists, 20 scientists would find out laser in approx 0,6 x time of 10 scientists. When having large groups the effect would increase to something like- 200 scis over 100 -> time is 0,8 x.

 

This would mean that spreading out scientists over different projects would couse them to work more efficent. im not shure i suport that. Maybe if you mean the number of hired scientist.

[Tuoppi]

I meant the previous. No matter how many people are working on project, plasma cannon priciples or autopsies aren't done in a day. Analyzing data is the most time-consuming part, but experimenting takes time too, and that cannot be hurried.

[Paladin]

VERY good points, Tuoppi.

 

The research model WOULD greatly benefit from a realism overhaul... Esp. with encouraging the spread of research, and the bigger techs taking a year... with authopsies a few days...

[Qonfused]

I meant the previous. No matter how many people are working on project, plasma cannon priciples or autopsies aren't done in a day. Analyzing data is the most time-consuming part, but experimenting takes time too, and that cannot be hurried.

 

 

I agree there should be some sort of minimum time for some of the advanced projects. And having 50 scientists doing a autopsy on 1 corpse would be ineficent. but this kind of small exponensial funksjon seems to general and unrealistic.

 

creating different project times, (acording to the number scientists) for different projects, shuldn't be that hard.

 

a autopsy would be somthing like:

http://www.home.no/henrikqvigstad/autopsy.bmp

 

 

while plasma tecnologi would be somthing like:

http://www.home.no/henrikqvigstad/plasmarifle.bmp

[Tuoppi]

Exactly. My example was oversimplified... i meant that a logarithmic dependance would be far better than linear. Somekind of feedback would be needed to determine most useful combinations without exessive testing, i don't think that anyone wants to dry this blind. A displayed estimate curve like those you had, Qonfused, would do fine IMO.

[54x]

Were research to be adjusted along those lines, it would need to be mentioned in the docs. Glad you guys like my weapon groups idea

 

I agree with both points- that it'd be nice to have a few more technologies to research, and that research in general doesn't scale very well. The game could gain a whole lot of gameplay plusses by extending research a bit longer

[Paladin]

I'm 100% with you guys on this

[sir_schwick]

How about on each project there is a set of tasks that might need to be done:

 

Observation

Experiments

Analysis

Testing Hypothesis

 

For each tech to be finished with research one to several hypothesis must be successfully reached. Reaching successful conclusions would be somewhat random, but increased by similair knowledge. Also, the number of people for each stage would vary. WHen you start projects you would determine resources and scientists dedicated to it.

[Qonfused]

A hypothesis is a assumtion, not a conclution. its the basis of theoris.

the most comanly used scientific metodes used today is the hypothetic-deductive method.

http://home.columbus.rr.com/sciences/hypot...o-deductive.htm

 

You start out with a Hypothesis(and under hypothesis)

Then you think off any form of effects that may arrise from the hypothesis.

Then you conduct experiments

 

If the experimenst match expected effects of hypothesis then the hypothesis is strengthened

If not, the hypothsis is wrong.

[sir_schwick]

I should have said you need to reach certain conclusions. That was a typo on my part.

[EmoteControl]

The thing about X-com's weapons research which bothered me wasn't the time it took, but that everything was interchangeable. That ammunition captured from aliens could be used in a weapon produced by humans always struck me as being silly. By the same token alien weapons and human weapons were not listed seperately in the base inventory screen (at least I think they were, I haven't fired up the game in a while now).

[Daimond]

Hiya all you dont know me yet but you will

I love X-com and always say its the best game ever crated "well UFO defence anyway" ill help in anyway i can.

 

First about emotecontrols question about the interchangeable parts from alien to human made stuff. reason they did that was almost every thign you made required elirum 115 if i spelled that right. and it was hard to come buy and was best spent on biger things, if they didnt make it so you could just take there ammo and use it you would be out of plasma and such vary fast all the time. In no way would i want the 115 easy to get, reason being when you do have alot witch is rare its vary easy to beat the game.

 

as for the resurch part yes i like the idea but i think it should be easyer to create the air craft laser cannon and defence before the hand held weapons also goes for plasma. Now before you go off on me think of it this way, when resurching something is it not always easyer to build somehting large and takes longer to make it compact like rifles and pistals? just my thought that it should be the last thing you can make. EG laser weaponry -> Laser Cannon -> Laser defence -> laser hand helds.

 

I totaly agree with the idea about a limit on the # of people that can work on some progects, but i should add that it could be increased depending on the number of items you have to work on, like say if you have 1 grey then only 10 guys can work on the body but if you have 3 grey then you can pool 30 guys on it. this also works on the items such as pistals and such, but what always got me is when they work on then it des not use up the items. like say you are working on Plasma pistals and have 5 you set 3 aside for being worked on by say 30 guys or such they should be used up becuase they are taking them apart to study right? just a though, always buged me in the game. The only things that should no be used up would be things that can not be taken apart such as the Elirum 115.

Edited July 17, 2005 by Daimond

[Tuoppi]

A good idea with multiple research subjects speeding up, it would make a lot of sense. IMO there should still be some ultimate speed limit for research, meaning that a thousand scientists researching million guns would still take a long time to complete their studies. In bigger projects there would be countless manhours wasted for logistic reasons alone, and eventually some people have to collect all the processed data and make conclusions from it.

 

Some way up with my confusing post i meant that after some of these alterations to the whole research system, player needs a better feedback on research speed, and ways to best improve it than just "Unknown", "Poor" or "Excellent". It would be very frustrating to try and guess what would be efficient.

 

BTW, if scis have dismantled a thingie and can build another, wouldn't they put the original back together? Wouldn't work on all of the projects but...

[sir_schwick]

I imagine the human versions were designed to accept alien ammunition. However I do think that Alien weapons should be slightly more powerful, accurate, etc. That way collecting alien versions would be beneificial because they have been building them longer.

[sAdIsTiCmAcHiNe]

I like the diminishing returns for scientists

 

Maybe some method of guaging how many researchers are needed, and when you have too many.

 

This would also simplify prioritizing, as there's less emphasis on dumping every scientist you have on one project, so you feel better researching multiple objects at once.