how much better is SMAX over SMAC ?

[The Vagabond]

Could someone please answer the following question. Is SMAX an independent software or a supplement to SMAC? In other words, is it necessary to have SMAC installed before installing SMAX?

Another question: are SMAX and Allien Crossfire the same thing?

[Mr. President]

You need the original game to install SMAX. SMAX is another name for Alien Crossfire. Alien Crossfire sounds cooler so I usually say that.

[The Vagabond]

Thanks, Mr. President.

[MariOne]

I'd agree with last posts from Mongoose & RedFred.
With the precisation that I'm not at all a fan of SMAX.

True, there are several new items, in terms of

1. native units
2. unit components
3. facilities
4. projects
5. techs

1. add some variety in interaction with wild units; not bad, a minor influence on the game
2. overrated
3. interesting the sea-enhancing trio, as said above. Interesting the Covert-ops center, but not that much after all. New buildings for missile defense, but hardly influential against a dumb AI, hardly get there in a PBEM
4. Interesting the new facilities-adding ones, as said above. When I play SMAC tho, I barely miss the use of CBA, the rest of new project are just some flavoring...
5. Interesting only as related to the new items they allow. They also screwed up some hierarchy, in the sense that now is possible to discover Hybrid Forests *before* Tree Farms, and of course you can't build the formers without the latters.

The main thing grounding my opposition to SMAX is this:
they added some bug-fixing code in the SMAX terrax.exe executable.
That should be a good thing.
As the fixed bugs were in the old code (of course SMAC bugs could not be in the sections added for SMAX new features...), the fix could have been equally applied to the old executable, terran.exe. After all, the fixing code had been written, they could have included it in a SMACv5 patch, with almost no additional effort.
But no, they decided to not do it. Why?
Because SMAX was sold at full price, and had they released just the fixing code for the old version, without all the new frills, they thought many customers would have contented to get the bug fixes for free without purchasing the expansion.
Thus, admitting that they considered a bug-fixing patch a decisive item when considering the purchase.
In practice, they counted on *selling* you the latest patch, instead that releasing for free that last piece of code to fix the *defective* items thay had already sold you in the first place.

So, IMHO the new items only add for a 10%-15% (at best) to the game experience.
I would NOT have paid a full-game price just for them.
When I play SMAX, I mainly do it because it has the Maintenance Bug and the Golden Age bug fixed. And I curse Firaxis everytime as I had to shell another 50$ to get those fixes (despite I waited almost a year before getting it!).
Now that SMAX hit the bargain bins, I'd say that as expansion it could be interesting to get, at NO MORE than 10$, and that could already be too much. That should have been the retail price for the expansion from its start. To be an actual "bargain", it should be really sold at 5$ rather than 10...

[waab]

Actuly I think SMAC-X was something really fun, mostly because my favorit faction is in it, but also because you could make factions with new abilities like pirats starting on see...and so on.

I like the new alien units but the new weapons is totaly pointless.

Some fun new buildings, I think it is a really good idea to buy it.

[Alinestra Covelia]

Missiles are no longer the game-decider that they used to be. There are now a wealth of "factional missile defences" available to the player if you play using SMAX rules.

[MattyBoy]

I felt that it added 10% to the game and I bought it at great inconvenience from US Ebay. But, if it's your favourite game, it's time and effort well spent.

The main mistake that I made was to get excited about the new factions. Despite having the option of the new factions, I rarely use them now.

Why? because each of them was distorted or overpowered enough that it made for a narrow (linear) game. e.g: Drones are a challenge until you work out they need to be played, then the fun is over.

[MattyBoy]

The thing that I liked best about SMAX over SMAC was the rebalancing of artillery, so that they become part of gameplay now.

[Mr. President]

I agree that SMAX is quite a decent game, but I sort of lost interest after a while, mainly due to the "Resonance" technologies. (At one point I even made original-game files for the Usurpers and Caretakers so I could put them in non-SMAX games.) That said, I'd definitely recommend it.

[MattyBoy]

Yep, those new tech's are just a pain in the ar$e (is that spelt a$$?). As a result the tech race feels less compelling.

[Mr. President]

The best part about Adaptive Economics is listening to Judaa Marr's cool-sounding voice.

[Adalbertus]

As I've bought both SMAC and SMAX at bin prices (+shipping), I've not paid too much for the both of them. SMAX definitely isn't a totally new game, it feels a bit "strange" as there are two histories (planet+aliens) mixed in one, so far from a purely aesthetical point of view. The new factions all seem a bit overpowered (most so the aliens in human hands ...), perhaps with the exception of Fungboy. But they give really a difference to the game (i usually have random factions for the AI). I could well live without the resonance/pulse weapons. Of the special abilities, I like most the soporific gas (roughly, a weaker version of nerve gas, but no atrocity).
The new SPs are nice, though CBA a bit overpowered. Oh, and there are two new missile types: Tectonic payload to raise land (never really used it), and fungal payload which is too expensive to be really useful, but it can be quite a fun to ruin an empire only by planting fungus when the opponent has no means to counter this (no Green SE choice, -1 Planet)

[Phil_de_geezer]

I found SMAX to be much better than SMAC because things seem to work. I remember still having the SMAC AI build tons of artilery units even after installing the patch that claimed to fix it.

[Method]

i really like WAVE especially (well actually only) on air units. it counters abilities like trance and AAA so a WAVE chopper can attack without getting killed by AAA defenders. WAVE psi choppers tend to be useful too if you have a high planet rating and the dream twister.

i don't think the new factions are overpowered. you might think the aliens are but all you have to do is nerve gas them .

[Pandemoniak]

There's even simplet than mind nerve then, just send a a couple of probe team in a weak city, and make some drones. Alien will (very often) simply cut nerves of Drones, thus loosing all their "trade-like" energy bonus, which will make them far weaker for about 20 turns.

I dont really think SMAX factions are overpowered, except that whatever the game I played, it always seem that Gaian and Pirates are stronger than the others. Maybe its just the AI which plays better with them, because I dont think they really are more powerful than Free Drones, for example.