help w alien vs human scenario

[AGRICOLA]

Good looking scen. It certainly looks like a nailbiter.

Being an inveterate trader, the first thing I tried out was the novel helicopter Air Freight, IMHO a highly original idea. Unfortunately, it appears that a freight unit has to be domain=0 [land]. Making it an air or sea unit seems to negate its role=7 [trade].

Thanks for making the new names of city improvements such that they actually describe their function.

BTW, a beta version of a scen is one that a designer has himself tested fully and asks for feedback from other players. I think that yours is an alpha version which, as you say, you are still in the process of testing.

[Jerec]

Agricola-

Alpha version, then. I'll remember the distinction, and try to fix the trade unit. I'm pretty sure I'll be able to fix it!

I hate it too when I can't figure out an improvement's use without consulting the cyclopedia. Thanks for playtesting!

Cyrion-

I'll thoroughly playtest the carrier, thanks for the tip.

Anybody who playtests-

It's important for me to report the # of turns it took to finish the scen as the humans. An event is geared to bring in powerful alien units (Elites) and I don't want the player to finish the game before the event can trigger.

[Jerec]

I was wondering...

Does anybody happen know if you can have a carrier air unit? I have a stupendous pic for a space station.

[Cyrion]

Yes we know that... no you can't

An "air carrier" would be really useful, be it for other air units or for air transport of land units, but sadly it's impossible!

[AGRICOLA]

I'm on turn 27 of a Deity game and have a few comments on what has happened so far.

1. I would suggest eliminating both barbarians and pollution (global warming) from the scen. I can't see how the barbs fit into a simple human vs hodad fight. Who are they supposed to represent? Certainly not other humans.

Furthermore, the hodads use nukes on them and while players can clean up pollution around their own cities, they have no means of cleaning it up somewhere in the boondocks. Global warming becomes inevitable.

If and when you want global warming eliminated, I can hexedit the .scn file. I have already done it to my game.

2. There are a number of human units (Spy Satellite, Command Center, etc) which do not appear on the Pedia list of military units so one must go to rules to find out their capabilities . . . . a real and unnecessary pain in the neck.

3. When the hodads get Industrialization, their city icons change to Early Industrial red brick. I'm sure that one of the SL designers can help you fix that.

4. I'm playing a very simple game in that only defensive, production and pollution (first Darwin, then Recycling Centers) city improvements have been built and the only units built have been Behemoths because of their excellent A/D = 20/12.

The high D has been very necessary because there have been heavy and continuous attacks on Bases 1 and 3. There were a couple of dicey moments in the first 15 turns.

Mexico City was taken on turn 20, but I don't expect to take Houston much before turn 30. The arrival of the first Elites has just been announced.

The scen has played with no glitches but I'm afraid that from now on, hodad cities can be captured no faster than one every 3-4 turns (i.e. as quickly as I can build the 2 Behemoths needed to garrison each captured one).

[Jerec]

First of all, thanks again for testing my sub-alpha version of this scen Agricola. To tell the truth, I was scared that people would try this scen and say

Now that you've said it at least has the makings of a good scenario, I'll work to make a decent version! btw the behemoth isn't all powerful. I'd love to see your face when you hit the plasmic shield in Chicago! One of those things could wreck a dozen behemoths. Forces you to build Hell on Wheels. I'll also make the Gnat's and Raptor's good points more pronounced. (the Gnat has paradrop, and the Raptor has the highest move ratio right now.) You should also try to locate Labor Camps and send an infantry/sniper unit to raid. The commandoes created are A/D=14/2, enough, I think, to take down a particle field. The test labs create cyborgs, great sidekicks for behemoths, and they have Aegis capability.

I'll now insert every single unit into the cyclopedia. I first thought, "mystery", so defend the Command Center with your life. didn't think about looking it up in the rules. I'll definitely change that.

I've fixed the red brick bug. I put all the techs on no no except the Hodad tech tree and Space flight. That way the Hodads can't research Steam Engine or Industrialization, just their techs! The humans can't research a thing except space flight and then future tech.

I really screwed up on 2 points-sound and events

For sound, I accidentally jumbled the files, I do know how I did that, so it just needs reorganizing.

As for events, I thought you could spawn multiple units from one trigger (besides turn interval). So I need to double the event sizes. Again, just needs work. Sorry, Agricola, that will really take a lot from the scen until it's fixed.

I'm afraid I need another boost, McMonkey/HT whoever. I don't no how to minimize or get rid of barbs, and don't know how to turn pollution off. Help! Or, if you can't turn pollution off, I'll gladly accept your help in hexediting away global warming, Agricola.

After playtesting through a few games, I realized this is similar to Red Front- try to survive, then gather forces and fight back in bits and pieces. I don't want the game to take that long though, so I'll stick in more human unit rewards and lower particle field D. I like at least medium-short games. NOT 30 hrs. I just don't have the time. I'm rambling now, so I'll stop.

[Jerec]

Agricola, I forgot to mention that my air freight trade unit fix bombed. Oh well. Maybe it was an original idea because no one else was dumb enough to try it.

I added a ground trader, and changed the air freight to build cost 200 shields and had it unavailable to build. Then I added a repeating event bringing it in just to disband for a shield boost to whatever you're building...good idea?

I thoroughly tested the carrier/sea transport unit. That bombed too. Thanks for catching that Cyrion.

[AGRICOLA]

. . . . btw the behemoth isn't all powerful. I'd love to see your face when you hit the plasmic shield in Chicago! One of those things could wreck a dozen behemoths.

I ran a test on that by creating 3 vet Behemoths outside Chicago and attacking. When the dust settled, one Behemoth was dead but so was the Plasmic Shield and two Particle Fields.

. . . . I'll now insert every single unit into the cyclopedia. I first thought, "mystery", so defend the Command Center with your life. didn't think about looking it up in the rules.

The CC was one of the first units I disbanded at the start of the scen to IRB Behemoths.

After playtesting through a few games, I realized this is similar to Red Front- try to survive, then gather forces and fight back in bits and pieces.

Exactly. My survival phase lasted 16 turns. At that point all 5 Bases had SDI, max shield production and at least 1 defending Behemoth. The next phase involved building Behemoths (plus getting 2 spawned Rad Troopers) for attacking and accumulating 1000+ gold to RB vital defensive improvements in a captured city.

[Jerec]

"could wreck a dozen behemoths"...I said this after losing 4 non vet behemoths against a plasmic. I guess vet really matters in some cases.

I didn't like the way my scen was going in two ways. One, there was a great survival period, then it settled into the routine of building behemoths and capturing a city one at a time. Also, on my second playthrough I subjugated the whole U.S. by the 26th turn. I have two major problems here: boredom and easiness. So...

I made the behemoth and raptor event created when you destroy an immovable hodad factory unit. There are seven factory units in remote places at the start of the game, with only one already shown. Every 4-5 turns or so another factory gets created in a totally new spot. No predictability. I'm assuming this will liven up the game, forcing more recon and hit-and-run raids. Also, the Hodad red-brick bug has been definitely fixed. I put two techs-plastics and steam engine-on no no.

Of course, I also had to discover another bug: the Hodad tech tree somehow won't show up to be researched as Hodads. I don't think anyone else ran into this bug. Any ideas how to fix this?

Agricola, I apologize for my earlier version of this scen. Not ready for launching to other people, really. As such, I've attached the updated version (without sound) to this post. It has more robust events, and has the factory units as well, besides a number of other small changes. Since the Hodad tech tree is messed up, I simply gave the Hodads 2 new, more powerful units at the beginning of the game. This should eliminate the senseless, mass kamikaze attacks of hovertanks and fighters. There will be worthwhile enemies. Please tell me if you enjoy it, seeing that enjoyment is my main reason for making this scen. Please also tell me your opinion on if it's too easy, hard, or you're getting bored.

[Jerec]

Quick Christmas list for the creator community to possibly help with-

1) barbs. How do you minimize/get rid of barbs?

2) any way to get rid of pollution itself?

3) my Hodad tech tree won't show when you're given a list to choose what you want to research next

That's my Christmas list. I expect these answered by Christmas!

[AGRICOLA]

...I said this after losing 4 non vet behemoths against a plasmic. I guess vet really matters in some cases...

Unless it happens to be a scen without barracks, airfields and port facilities, I never, ever fight with non-vet units. A bit of time spent with Kobayashi's Combat Odds Calculator or one of the other simulators shows the huge effect of +50% A/D. I don't think that everyone realizes how important the 'vet' designation is.

Similarly, city terrain D bonuses make all the difference in the world in a very tough scen. In the difficult original Hodad scen and in Red Front, I took the time to transform the terrain of front line cities to forest. Often that was the only difference between a destroyed attacker and a destroyed defender.


One more minor problem with Hodads that you may want to take a look at: the units that have Role=3 (Air Superiority) and, therefore, are able to shoot down airlifts.

I noticed at the start of the scen that most attempted airlifts were in danger of being shot down. I figured that this was because of the large number of Drone Fighters around all bases. However, after taking Mexico City and killing a Supernova (Nuke) in it, there were no more warnings for ~15 turns despite swarms of the flying drones.

I took a look at rules to try to sort out why a Supernova is able to shoot down a distant airlift when a Drone Fighter can't threaten an airlift right under its nose. A Supernova has Role=3, a Drone Fighter doesn't. By the same token, I was pleasantly surprised at the number of Hodad airlifts that were being regularly shot down even though I had no air units. That mystery was solved when I saw that human Spy Satellites are Role=3.

You may want to re-examine which units deserve Role 3.

[Jerec]

Being a strategy nut, ever since I started playing MGE I would always use terrain to my advantage. I love that aspect of this game. Vet...I think I did realize the importance, but I haven't made it a strict rule like you have. I should though, I know.

I'll look into the Role 3. Satellites I think I can't fix. The drones however...they should be Role 3!! That's weird, and I'll immediately fix it. Thanks for mentioning it.

[Patine]

I just noticed this thread, and I too have a Human vs. Alien scen in the works in my queue to eventually be finished. Mine has a bit more of a complicated background, though, and isn't based on the FW scen, but I find your set-up intriguing nonetheless. My thread is buried right now, but I'll try to find it and dig it out in a bit. Good luck!

[Jerec]

Pardon my ignorance, but what does FW stand for?

[McMonkey]

FW = Fantastic Worlds
MGE = Multiplayer Gold Edition
ToT = Test of Time