UFO - ENEMY UNKNOWN
AMIGA 1200
Frequently Asked Questions and Strategy Guide (updated 12/28/94)
maintained by Kuo-Sheng (Kasey) Chang [PC]
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Amiga update by Tommy Iversen (Mr.T) [AMIGA]
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(MrT - IRC)
(Last updated : 4 Feb 1995)
This is the AMIGA version of the faq. The cost of equipment,ammo and
lots of other stuff has changed from the pc version, so I decided to
update it for all you Amiga freaks out there. Amiga 4 ever guys !!
If you have anything to add or something is wrong, please mail me at me
email, so I can update this faq again.
I have not done any calculations (Math is not my strong side), so if anyone
out there feels for it, PLEASE do it, and mail me the result.
WARNING * WARNING * WARNING * WARNING * WARNING * WARNING
This FAQ and strategy article conatins info that you may prefer to find out
by exploring and researching yourself. If you want to play the game in the
dark then read on with care or not at all!!
This FAQ was prepared using a wide range of material, including two existing
UFO/XCOM FAQ's, Computer Gaming World's Strategy article, Computer Game
Review's Strategy article (both are September 94), and the collective wisdom
of fellow XCOM players of which there are too many to mention. In future
updates all attempts will be made to credit each author with their specific
hint.
This version has been reorganized somewhat. All tables have been moved into
the appendix section along with associated notes and hints. There are more
discussion on how to cope with the 80-item limit, differences between the
different type of shots and air attacks, and when to use each, and more.
If you have any comments or other strategies, please submit them to the
author via e-mail at the addresses above.
Thanks to the following:
* Julian Gallop, XCOM High Commander (XCOM Creator)
* Jeff James, XCOM Strategist (CGW Strategy Writer)
* Kevin Perry, XCOM Strategist (CGR Strategy Writer)
* William Kang, commander, X-COM Strike Team 1 (FAQ Writer)
* Tim Chawn, commander, X-COM Strike Team 2 (FAQ Writer)
(Sorry about your name spelled wrong!)
* Stuart Lamble, sergeant (Contributor)
* Doug Osborne, master sergeant (frequent contributor)
* SCOHN (?), sergeant (Contributor)
* And all the fellow X-COM players, without whom this Strategy Guide
will not exist!
(Any one I missed?)
Now, let's go save Earth!
Table of Contents
1.0 General Information about XCOM .....................................2
1.1 What is X-COM : UFO Defense?.....................................2
1.2 What's the difference between X-COM and UFO:Enemy Unknown?.......3
1.3 What type of AMIGA do I need to run it?..........................3
* 1.4 Sounds cool, but I'd like to try it first......................4
1.5 How about any known bugs?........................................4
* 1.6 Are there any patches available for those bugs?................5
* 1.7 I need some help! Any saved game editors?.....................5
1.8 Any plans on sequels or expansion disks? Other versions?........5
2.0 How to use this strategy guide .....................................5
2.1 Dealing with flying UFOs.........................................5
2.2 Dealing with landed or crashed UFOs..............................6
2.3 Dealing with Terror Sites........................................6
2.4 Your initial lack of technology..................................6
2.5 Your limited budget..............................................6
2.6 Alien infiltration of governments................................6
2.7 Alien bases on Earth.............................................6
3.0 Strategy on Bases ..................................................6
3.1 Where should I build bases?......................................6
3.2 Base Types and evolution.........................................7
3.3 Base Construction................................................8
3.4 Defending a base.................................................8
4.0 Air Combat and Intercept Strategies ...............................10
4.1 Intercept tactics...............................................10
4.2 Weapons vs. target..............................................10
4.3 Differences among Aggressive, Normal, and Cautious attacks......11
4.4 Craft Weapons Tactics...........................................12
4.5 Finding the alien base..........................................12
4.6 Keep soldiers in bases [IMPORTANT]..............................12
5.0 Ground Combat Strategies ..........................................12
5.1 Basic equipment considerations..................................12
5.2 General Tactics.................................................13
5.3 Weapon Tactics.................................................16
5.4 Assault tactics.................................................18
5.5 Capturing aliens................................................19
5.6 Psi / Anti-Psi Tactics..........................................21
5.7 Different shots and different weapons...........................21
5.9 Misc. Ground Combat Questions and Answers.......................22
6.0 Research and Manufacture Strategies ...............................24
6.1 What should I research?.........................................24
6.2 Suggested Research Priorities...................................25
6.3 Research Strategies.............................................25
6.4 Research Cheat [Verified].......................................25
6.5 Manufacture Strategies..........................................26
7.0 Logistics and Material Management ................................26
7.1 Why is Elerium important?.......................................26
7.2 I keep running out of funds! What do I do?.....................26
7.3 Dealing with Equipment Shortages................................27
7.4 When to sack / retire things....................................28
7.5 Equipping Landing Crafts........................................28
9.0 Misc. questions and answers .......................................29
A. Appendix of Tables .................................................29
A.1 Base Facilities.................................................30
A.2 X-COM Crafts and Craft Weapons..................................30
A.3 UFO Types.......................................................31
A.4 Ground Combat Weapons...........................................32
A.5 Alien Information...............................................33
A.6 Costs...........................................................34
A.7 TU Usage by Activity............................................36
A.8 Profitability study.............................................36
1.0 General Information about XCOM
1.1 What is X-COM : UFO Defense?
[Excerpt from X-COM manual, page 6]
It is the year 1999. Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs) have
started appearing with disturbing regularity in the night skies.
Reports of violent human abductions and horrific experimentation
has struck terror into the hearts of millions. Mass public
hysteria has only served to expose Earth's impotence against a
vastly superior technology.
[...]
On December 11, 1998, representatives from the world's most
economically powerful countries gathered secretly in Geneva. After
much debate, the decision was made to establish a covert
independent body to combat, investigate, and defeat the alien
threat. The organization would be equipped with the world's finest
pilots, soldiers, scientists, and engineers, working together as
one multi-national force.
This organization was named the Extraterrestrial Combat Unit.
[End Excerpt]
You are in overall command of X-COM. You will launch interceptors
to attack UFOs, send soldiers out to attack (crashed) UFOs, raid
alien bases on Earth (if you can find them), keep the sponsor
nations happy (by shooting down the UFOs and prevent terror
attacks), buy the ammo and weapons you need in the war, research
for better weapons as your troops brings in alien artifacts for
analysis, manufacture the new weapons, pay for everything by
sponsor countries' contributions and by selling excess stuff, and
eventually figure out where the alien threat is coming from and end
the threat once and for all.
The strategic level is centered on a screen with a rotate-able /
zoom-able 3D globe (GeoScape), with buttons to manipulate your
bases, check UFO activity, check your funding levels from the 15
sponsoring nations, and to look up data in your on-line UFOpedia.
At the tactical level (BattleScape) you control troops/tanks in 3D
combat which is quite similar to Syndicate and Populous.
1.2 What's the difference between X-COM and UFO:Enemy Unknown?
Nothing. UFO:EU is the European version of X-COM, where the game
came from. The game is developed by Mythos Games, based in
England, which is headed by Julian (Laser Squad) Gallop. The game
was picked up by Microprose U.K. and imported to the US.
MicroProse US changed the name because subLOGIC (the original
Flight Simulator people, now R.I.P.) had a game called UFO. That
one uses actual physics for its flight model (huh?!), and include
this dumb little game where you gather fuel so your mother ship can
leave Earth. It can use any scenery disks that you got for FS, and
was never very popular any way. There is also a CD-ROM
"multimedia" program called UFO that collects all those UFO
pictures, interviews, and so on a while back.
1.3 What type of Amiga do I need to run it?
Amiga 1200 with 2 mb ram. The game will be slow, but playable!
More ram and a accelrator board will speed up the game.
If you play from a 2 mb Amiga 1200, the game will make a boot
disk for you.
The copy protection is a code at the bottom of each odd-numbered
page of the quite well written 128-page manual.
* 1.4 Sounds cool, but I'd like to try it first...
Im not sure if there is a playable preview of this game. If anyone
got a PP, please let me know.
1.5 How about any known bugs?
Well, I'v atleast found 1 horrible bug in this game, but I don't know
(yet) if anyone else has the same bug. I'll try to find out.
1.5.1 The research bug [AMIGA]
This is a bug that I can't ALWAYS reproduce, but it has hit me a
few times now. When doing research on a Sectoid Medic, Floater
Soldier (?) or anything simular, the game sometime gurus when
the reasearch is complete. What happens is that when the reasearch
reports pops up on your screen, you will see the info on something
completely different than you researched. When you hit ok, the machine
will guru.
The random bug ? [AMIGA}
Well, there appears to be a few random bugs in this game.
- Iv lost tanks on missions where I never brought a tank.
- Soldiers sometimes die without beeing shoot or leaving the
xcom craft (This happend to me. A soldier died from fatal wound.
He never left the ship and had other soldiers in front of him.
He died on the first round. Don't ask me what happend.
Maybe a bug, maybe not.
1.5.2 Intercept Save Bug [PC]
This is a PC BUG. I have not tested this on the Amiga version.
If anyone have found the same bug, PLEASE let me know !!!
[MPS] If you save a game while an intercept in progress (i.e. craft
is in the air and you minimized the window to save) the saved game
is corrupt and cannot be reloaded (it will crash the computer).
This probably causes the 1.5.1 Green Text Bug. Work around is DO
NOT SAVE DURING INTERCEPTS.
1.5.3 The One-Shot Blaster Bug [PC]
Yet another pc bug. I have not tested this one either. If anyone
found this bug or can confirm that it works fine on the Amiga version
please let me know !!!
[FAQ] The blaster launcher, when fired with only one way point,
cannot be reloaded. It will show there's no round in the weapon,
but when you drop a round in the weapon it will say "Weapon is
already loaded". [Net] You can actually UNLOAD the "empty" shell
and drop it. See "How Do I UNload a Weapon". For now, the work
around is program launch with two or more waypoints.
* 1.5.4 The Flying Frozen Bug [PC]
Not tested on Amiga version. Please confirm this anyone, and let
me know !
[Net / SCOHN] Sometimes a soldier flying (with a flying suit, of
course) or a hovertank is stuck at the edge of the map. S/he is
OFF the map, and can only go up or down, but not back onto the map.
S/he will recover when mission is successfully completed. No
workarounds.
* 1.6 Are there any patches available for those bugs?
Not that I know of. If im wrong, let me know !
* 1.7 I need some help! Any saved game editors?
Well, I don't know of any editors, but I have some cheats here.
They include 8 bases stuffed with equipment and people working there
soo you can fight off those evil aliens :-)
If you want them, just email me and I'll send you a uudeocoded version
or I chould upload it to Aminet if anyone is instrested.
1.8 Any plans on sequels or expansion disks? Other versions? [PC]
Can anyone confirm that MPS are doing the same for the Amiga
versions ? The lates news I picked up from the net was that
MPS was dropping the Amiga for good. I don't know if this
is the truth, but I don't hope so.
MicroProse Rep on America On-Line has revealed at least one
(possibly two) scenario disks arebeing developed. According to
CGW's CES report, UFO2 is in the works, with better sounds and
graphics, but NO CHANGE to the combat system. (Hurray!)
There was some talk about a Macintosh version, but no decision has
been made. Mac users who want a Mac version should contact
MicroProse and voice your opinion. Try Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein. .
As you have read from (1.1), Earth is under attack by superior
technology. It is YOUR job to ensure the survival of Earth, even if it
means xenocide (hey, they started it!).
To achieve this, you will need to capture alien artifacts and live
aliens to gain information on where they come from, and go to the source
and deal with it once and for all. Of course, there are a lot of
obstacles in your way, including but not limited to the following:
* alien harvest and/or abduction
* alien terror attacks on innocent civilians
* your initial lack of technology
* your limited budget
* alien infiltration of governments
* alien bases on earth as center of operations
* and more...
Each of these has a counter-strategy, which will allow you at the end to
WIN. We will discuss each one in detail laster in this section.
2.1 Dealing with flying UFOs
Those flashing lights in the night sky are not fun any more. Shoot
them down and sort them out on the ground! See section 4.X for
strategy and tactics on air combat.
Once you got them on the ground, it's time to send out a boarding
party to capture and kill any surviving aliens and capture any
surviving alien artifacts. See section 5.X for Ground Combat
Strategies and Tactics.
2.2 Dealing with landed or crashed UFOs
So you manage to catch an UFO on the ground or shot one down!
Great! See section 5.X for Ground Combat Strategies and Tactics.
Remember that landed UFOs can take off again, and it will be hard
to catch then. Also, landed UFOs usually means there is an alien
base nearby.
2.3 Dealing with Terror Sites
Aliens are terrorizing civilians! Just like the intro animations,
your team rushes to the rescue of the defenseless civilians! See
section 5.X for Ground Combat Strategies and Tactics. Just
remember that civilian casualties must be avoided at all costs!
2.4 Your initial lack of technology
This can only be countered by research. See 6.X for Research and
Manufacture Strategies. Initially you have few options to go, but
as you capture alien hardware you will get more powerful weapons to
aid you in your quest to end the alien threat.
2.5 Your limited budget
The countries pay you certain amount of money each month, and may
increase or decrease the funding level depending on their
satisfaction level of your performance. Unfortunately, that source
of money is never enough. Section 7.X goes into detail on how you
can make more money.
2.6 Alien infiltration of governments
Aliens will attempt to force governments into abandoning the X-COM
project by attacking that country mercilessly until the government
signs a pact with them. As you can guess, we tried this on Hitler
just before World War II. It did not work then, it will not work
now, but that doesn't prevent stupid leaders from trying it. When
the goverernment signs the pact it ceases to fund the X-COM
project, so you may have problems... To deal with that, see 9.X
Miscellaneous Questions and Answers
2.7 Alien bases on Earth
Those pesky aliens have established bases on Earth! Those bases
are well-hidden and only a prolonged patrol by X-COM crafts will
find them. You should send soldiers to take them out as soon as
possible since those act as infiltration centers. See 5.X for
ground combat strategies.
3.0 Strategy on Bases
3.1 Where should I build bases?
Usually you start in either Europe or North America, as those contain
most of your sponsoring countries. Your second base would be in the
other area. As for others, check UFO activity and see below.
3.1.1 Suggested Placement
Central Europe (western USSR and all of Europe, India)
North America / Rockies (USA and Canada)
Japan (eastern USSR, Japan, and China)
Eastern South America (Brazil)
Australia (Australia and Pacific)
Central Africa (South Africa, Egypt, and Nigeria)
3.1.1 Ideal Placement
North Pole
South Pole / Antarctica
Southern United States
Persian Gulf
North-eastern Australia
Brazil, South America
Central Europe
Japan / USSR border
3.2 Base Types and evolution
You will probably have four to six types of bases. As you play you
will start upgrading them to the next level to create a more
effective detection and interception network.
3.2.1 Radar/Picket base
Just an access lift and some radars, plus maybe some storage for
HWP defense team and/or living quarters for defending soldiers.
Detect UFOs. Add more radars and defenses whenever possible.
The long range radars have 450 nm range, 5% detection / 10 minutes,
and short range radar have 300 nm range, 10% detection / 10
minutes. Adding more radars would improve chances of detection. A
hyperwave decoder would also help.
3.2.2 Airbase
Base with a hangar or two housing an Interceptor or Firestorm, used
to intercept and shoot down UFOs, as well as to patrol for enemy
bases. HINT: Use an empty Skyranger to tail UFOs for bases can be
very effective as Skyranger has the longest range of any Terran
craft.
Can be improved from radar base by adding hangar(s). You would
also need storage space for the craft weapons and ammo.
3.2.3 Strike base
Base with at least one transport (Skyranger, Lightning, or
Avenger), as well as living quarters and storage. Houses soldiers
and equipment. Used to board UFOs and/or attack alien bases.
Can be created from both radar base or airbase by adding a hangar
for the transport. Remember to add more storage space for the
increased need for weapons and ammo as well as captured artifacts.
Also add alien containment in case you took prisoners.
3.2.4 Command Center
The EVERYTHING base, includes research and manufacturing. Your
first base is your first (and probably only) command center, where
all the research and manufacturing is done. Most people have this
configuration instead of 3.2.5 and 3.2.6.
3.2.5 Research Lab
Some players suggested that you should separate the research
facility from airbase or attack base as to minimize loss of
research against alien retaliation raids which destroyed the base.
Transfer objects to be researched is CHEAP, and you only need ONE
of the objects to research.
3.2.6 Manufacturing / Engineering Facility
You just need living quarters and workshops for the engineers, and
general stores for storing the results, and maybe a hangar if you
are manufacturing crafts. Transfer between bases are cheap, and
you don't need anything else. A nice place to put this is
Antarctica.
3.3 Base Construction
Bases are the guts of X-COM defense. You must build them carefully to
minimize risks while maximize possible benefits.
3.3.1 Plan for defense!
Try to isolate hangars and access lifts from the rest of the base
to create a choke point. For example:
Design A Design B
HHHHHH HHHHHH
HHHHHH HHHHHH
A X
X XXXX XXXXXX
X XXXX X XXXX
XXXXXX A XXXX H=Hangars A=Access Lift X=anything else
Design A: ALL vulnerable areas are concentrated to ONE part of the
base, limiting possible attacks along that ONE long corridor.
Design B: Isolates Hangar from Access Lift. Since hangars have no
doors, blaster bombs and/or fusion tanks can destroy everything in
those spaces with one shot per hangar, counting the secondaries due
to the fuel drums. The access lift can be blocked by proximity
grenades.
3.3.2 Watch each base carefully
Plan ahead for expansion. Use the BASE INFORMATION button
frequently (once every 10 game days?) and start construction of
things BEFORE you actually run out.
3.3.3 Initial modifications
First things you need to add to your main base are: alien
containment (prisoners), general stores (more ammo and captured
artifacts), and long range radar (improve detection). Later, add
living quarters, labs, workshops, and defenses when needed.
3.3.4 Keep a hangar available!
You should always keep a hangar SOMEWHERE available for new
construction purposes. Transfer a craft between bases is free.
See base types for details.
3.4 Defending a base
Aliens do try to raid your base. The loss of the base means the
loss of everything based on it. So what can you do to prevent the
destruction of your base? Several things besides 3.3.1.
3.4.1 Build defenses
You can build four types of base defenses:
days cost upkeep def accuracy
Missile Defense 16 200k 5k 500 50%?
Laser Defense 24 900k 10k 600 60%
Plasma Defense 36 1200k 12k 900 70%
Fusion Defense 36 1800k 14k 1200 80%
In addition, there's two more facilities that helps in Defence
Grav Shield 38 2300k 15k Gives another chance of hitting
Mind Shield 33 1300k 5k "Cloaks" base from alien scout
[CGW] Your base defense rating should be over 2500 to successfully
and consistently repel alien attacks.
[KSC] I recommend over 3500, PLUS grav shields, if you don't like
fighting inside your own base. Three fusion ball defense is
enough. Over course of a month, I allowed alien battleships to
attack my main base, which has the above. In ten tries, only ONE
battleship made it through my defenses (somehow four out of six
shots missed). Only eight Ethereals and one Sectopod made it down
against 10 hovertanks (2 of them Fusion Ball launchers).
* 3.4.2 Attack the incoming UFOs
[FAQ] Usually you can detect the UFOs as they come in for the
attack. Shoot them down first. If you got Hyperwave Decoders,
watch for UFOs with "retaliation" missions. Those are coming after
your bases. The small UFOs that come first are scouts. If they
see your base, then comes the battleships.
[KSC] [Not verified] If you managed to intercept the attacking UFO,
stay in standoff mode, and it won't attack the base unless it
outrun you. If you attack with interceptors you'll lose them.
[Doug] If you think you can hold your base, you can let the UFO
through and just fight the ground action. Of course, you risk
getting your base wrecked, but you also get chance to capture
aliens and alien equipment.
[Net] In V1.0 of UFO, if you win a defend base action, you can gain
thousands of units of Elerium. This is no longer true in V1.2 of
UFO and X-COM.
3.4.3 Watch the "80-item limit"
If the aliens made their way down, you will have to defend
yourself. Only the first 80 items in storage can be used for your
Defence, so this is another reason to sell off those excess
inventory. Besides, you need the cash. Do NOT keep electro-flares
in the warehouse as those are often the first items int he 80-item
list! Lasers and HWPs are on top so keep them.
3.4.4 Keep some HWPs just in case
[CGR] HWP's only take up storage space, are the first things on the
storage item list (therefore always in those 80 items), and needs
no personnel to control, which makes them the ideal base defenders.
[KSC] Fusion Ball Launcher Hovertanks are absolutely great in base
defense, being able to shoot around corners. So are blaster
launchers, if you have them.
3.4.5 Booby trap the rooms!
Booby trap all rooms that you must abandon, usually by throwing
proximity grenades at the doors. Any alien steps in, BOOM! You
can clear them by dropping a regular grenade on top of them. See
Section 7.X on weapon tactics.
3.4.6 Leave some soldiers! [?]
[Questionable] When a base is under alien attack, ALL crafts are
evacuated ALONG WITH all soldiers and equipment onboard! To have
soldiers defending the base, you need to unload them from crafts
BEFORE the attack reaches your base, and make sure the base have
enough ammo and guns to let them defend. See 3.4.3.
[Doug] My soldiers stayed during alien base attack... Can someone
verify this?
4.0 Air Combat and Intercept Strategies
Air combat is an important part of X-COM. Without it, you will
have very little chance of capturing any aliens or alien equipment,
and thus have no progress in the game!
4.1 Intercept tactics
Interception of UFOs is important. Intercepting UFOs over
sponsoring countries tells them you are doing your job and keeps
them happy. Successful interception and shoot-down means you can
capture aliens, alien bodies, and alien equipment. Even if
interception is unsuccessful you may be able to discover alien
bases.
4.1.1 Feet dry! Feet dry!
Try to attack an UFO over land, because if you shoot it down at sea
no one can get to it. If you intercepted it over water, press
minimize and click over to 1 minute time step until you ran out of
fuel, it lands, it outruns you, or you got back over land. If you
fly back over land, change back to 5 seconds, then commence attack!
4.1.2 Go home early
When you send multiple crafts after one UFO and the UFO gets shot
down, the shooter will go home, but other crafts will continue onto
the crash site and THEN return. Instead, click on them and turn
them back early (Return to base). They will return earlier, thus
be refuled and rearmed faster for the next mission.
4.1.3 Keep Landed UFOs covered
Even if an UFO has landed, keep an interceptor on top of it if
possible until your landing craft arrives for the action. That
way, if the UFO takes off, you still have a chance to shoot it
down.
4.2 Weapons vs. target
Before attacking click on the VIEW UFO button to take a look at
your target before deciding whether to attack or not. Attacking
with the wrong weapons means either the loss of the interceptor or
the UFO totally destroyed so that nothing can be recovered. Also
see
4.2.1 Very Small / Small UFOs
Interceptors with Stingray missiles and cannons can only handle
very small or small sized UFOs. Attacking larger UFOs means heavy
damage or even destruction.
4.2.2 Medium UFOs
Interceptors with Avalanche missiles can handle medium UFOs. One
Avalanche will blow a very small UFO into pieces though.
4.2.3 Large UFOs
Interceptors with Plasma beam and/or Avalanche missiles can handle
large UFOs, but not VERY large UFOs. Plasma beam may blow small
UFO into pieces.
4.2.4 Very Large UFOs
Multiple Interceptors with plasma beam and/or Avalanche are needed
to attack very large UFOs, and you'll probably lose a few, since
one shot from battleship and the interceptor is destroyed or
crippled.
Interceptors with fusion ball launchers can attack very large UFOs
if it does so at maximum distance, but will probably run out of
ammo first since they are two shots each.
The only way to "safely" attack alien battleships is to use
Firestorms and Avengers, and even then you will probably be heavily
damaged (as in 20% to 60% damage), even with Fusion Balls and
Plasma beams.
4.3 Differences among Aggressive, Normal, and Cautious attacks
The difference between Aggressive, Normal, and Cautious attacks
were not explained clearly in the manual. Here's my version:
4.3.1 Cautious Attack
Attack the UFO from maximum range of the available weapon(s) at a
slow firing rate. Cause least damage per shot, useful when you
want prisoners or attacking a small target and your weapons may be
overkill.
4.3.2 Normal Attack
Attack the UFO from maximum range of the available weapon(s) at
standard firing rate. Cause average damage per shot, suffice for
most attacks if your weapon outrange the enemy's.
4.3.3 Aggressive Attack
Attack the UFO as fast as possible, as close as possible, and fire
as fast as possible. Cause most damage per shot, but exposes the
craft to enemy return fire.
4.3.4 Applications of each attack mode
To determine which attack mode to use, you need to look at the UFO
first. Click on the VIEW UFO icon and take a look at what type of
UFO it is. See section A.3 for list of UFOs and recognition chart.
Of all the UFOs, only battleship is a major threat to your crafts.
Battleship have a weapon range of ~70 kilometers, longer than even
fusion balls. NO OTHER UFO has this kind of firepower. The only
way to ensure destruction of a battleship is to use Firestorm or
Avenger with dual plasma beams. One shot from a battleship is
enough to destroy an Interceptor, so do NOT attack battleships with
Interceptors.
When attacking battleships with Avengers and Firestorm, use
Aggressive Attack. After several battleship interceptions with an
Avenger, I've found that using Aggressive Attack with an Avenger I
get approximately 40% damage (once as low as 30%) where as I
usually get 60% damage in Normal attack. Firestorm got hit pretty
hard against battleships, usually 50-80% damaged.
All other UFOs can be safely tackled with Avanlanche missiles and
plasma beams, since you can stay at maximum range and avoid their
fire. Supply Ship and Terror Ship have range of ~50 km, which is
the second longest, but Avalanche and Plasma beam outrange them.
4.4 Craft Weapons Tactics
4.4.1 Get Plasma Cannon quickly
Plasma Cannon is THE best craft weapon in the game, with 99 shots
and 54 km range. Interceptors armed with twin plasma cannons can
even tackle large (though not VERY large) UFOs safely by remaining
outside the UFO's weapon range.
4.4.2 Get rid of Stingray Missiles and cannons
Stingrays are only good for hitting VERY SMALL and maybe SMALL UFOs
due to the short range (30 for Stingray, 12 for cannon). Replace
Stingray and Cannon with Avalanches as soon as possible. You can
also forget about the laser cannon but at least it does not use
ammo.
4.5 Finding the alien base
Alien Bases can be found by two ways: X-COM agents can find an
enemy base for you, or you have to send out crafts and patrol
certain parts of the world. If you see a lot of UFO activity but
can't get any interceptions, there's probably a base in the area.
Hyperwave decoders, which can tell you what a UFO is up to, can
allow you to spot the UFOs on their SUPPLY runs. Once you spot a
supply UFO, use an empty Skyranger to follow it. If it disappears,
go to last known coordinates and start patrolling. With a couple
hours (game time) in the air you should see the base.
4.6 Keep soldiers in bases [IMPORTANT]
On the Amiga version it looks like you can have them in a flying
craft. They will join the defending of the base anyway. I can't
confirm this, but it seems like it works this way.
[PC]
Equip NO soldiers for the crafts until you are ready to launch the
intercept. You will lose no more than a few seconds of game time
(and real-time) when you equip the craft again with the team
members, and this prevents you from getting surprised when an enemy
UFO attack your base and your crafts took off with all your
soldiers. The same would go for the equipment as well. Unless
your base has lots of spares, unequip from the craft.
5.0 Ground Combat Strategies
Ground combat is arguably the most important aspect of X-COM, and
probably also the most satisfying part when a successful raid has
been completed. Here are some tactics and advises to keep your
soldiers alive and well and keep alien body counts mounting.
5.1 Basic equipment considerations
Since you only get 80 items per craft, you have to plan carefully.
Also see section 7.5 for further material management strategies.
Lasers are useful since they do not need ammo, saving you a lot of
items. They also cause a nice amount of damage (though not as much
as plasma weapons, thus the trade-off).
Once you got Blaster Bombs, carry those if you can afford them.
They start out as unloaded, unlike other weapons, so load them
during BEFORE the battle starts. Use them to flatten buildings and
fences, and to open new doors for entrances.
5.1.1 Basic Loadouts
Skyranger: 2 HWPs and 6 soldiers. Divide them up to 1 HWP / 3
person fire teams, with HWP as scouts. If necessary you can
split each team up further into pairs.
Lightning: only one choice since this thing does not carry HWP's
Avenger: 4 HWPs and 10 soldiers are good. Use 2 teams of 1 HWP and
2 soldiers, and 2 teams of 1 HWP and 3 soldiers, or you can
make them all 1 HWP and 2 soldiers, with two soldier as the
special weapons team with blaster bombs and/or psi attacks.
5.1.2 Rookie Training
Try to always take a couple of rookies along to give them
experience to boost their stats. In XCOM, you learn by doing. You
want more strength? Carry heavy stuff. More accuracy? Take more
shots. Soldiers with kills gain more than those without.
* 5.1.3 Avoid night missions
I have never ever had a Night mission on the Amiga version.
Is it possible ???
[Concensus] Avoid night missions if you can. The UFO can wait
until next morning or later unless they take off first. Just set
the craft to patrol nearby. Aliens hold an advantage in visibility
range at night (or appears to). If you ABSOLUTELY MUST, carry LOTS
of electroflares and incendiary weapons.
5.1.4 Mix up the weapons
Try to take along a mixed set of weaponry, like lasers, auto
cannons, AND plasma guns. This way you'll be ready for all sorts
of threats, as some aliens are more vulnerable to certain types of
weapons than to others. See A.2 for alien tables.
5.1.5 Use Stun on Terror [!?]
[CGW] When tackling terror sites, take along lots of stun weaponry
and stun any civilians that you find. Alien terrorists don't
attack unconscious civilians, and therefore the civilians count as
"saved" at the end. Just don't drop grenades on them or fire
rockets and missiles into the area.
[Net] Recently someone reported that stunned civilians, upon waking
up, are counted as enemy and must be killed to finish the battle.
Can someone verify this?
5.1.6 Misc. Equipment
* Medikits are important. In addition to healing fatal wounds
they can raise morale if used on panicking troops as well as
revive unconscious soldiers (hit by a stun bomb?)
* Motion detectors are useful for looking behind doors and walls,
but only helps if aliens moved
* Mind Probe is useful in identifying alien leaders and
commanders, or any specific type of alien you want to capture.
Make sure you have an arsenal of stun weapons.
* Proximity grenades are great for blockading large UFO doors.
Just drop one next to the door and wait for them to come out
5.2 General Tactics
* 5.2.1 Assign specialties to soldiers
[CGW/CGR/KSC] BEFORE you go on missions, examine each solider and
assign them a specialty, according to the weapons you have and the
soldier's abilities. The person(s) with the most strength would
carry Heavy Cannon, Auto-Cannon, or Rocket Launcher. The person(s)
with the most time units would be scout, and so on. After you've
decided, add a suffix to their name by clicking on the name in the
solider stat display and type. For example, if "Bill Donovan" has
lots of strength, make him "Bill Donovan/HW" (HW for Heavy
Weapons). That way, when you arrived at the battle, you can equip
the right people with the right stuff.
[KSC] Here's some suggested specialties and related equipment
Scout (SC) -- carry motion sensor
Medic (MD) -- carry Medi-Kit
Intelligence (IT) -- carry mind probe
Heavy Weapons (HW) -- carry "heavy" stuff
PsiCorp (PSI) -- carry psi amp for psi attacks *
* PsiCorp is named after the organization in Babylon 5 :-)
You can also cross-train, of course. There's no limit in the
number of spots each person can hold... And real-life SEAL teams
are all cross-trained any way.
[SCOHN] Another way of doing this is put the TUs / Fire / Throw /
Str in the person's name. For example, Bill 58/46/78/40. You may
have to update the stats after every mission or so, but it helps
you see a variety of skills quickly when you need to load up the
landing crafts.
5.2.2 Deploying from craft
[NET] Keep a grenade in hand as you deploy since sometimes there
are enemies right next to your landing craft. Grenades should also
be used to reduce any cover close to your craft that can hide an
alien.
[KSC] Only deploy two soldiers at a time. Next to the landing
gears is good. If you deploy all of them at once you invite
grenades and blaster bombs. Move the two away before deploying the
next two.
5.2.3 Spread out and cover each other
Bunch up invites enemy attack you with grenades, or worse,
blasterbombs. In general, about six to eight squares apart is far
enough.
Aliens DO attack from behind sometimes, so try to have two troopers
who can watch each other's back. This is ESPECIALLY important when
going up against Chryssalids, who moves extremely fast [120 TUs!]
One player reported losing the entire squad to a single Chryssalid
on a terror mission...
Here's a simple demonstration with a four person fire team:
X X
X X
===>>
X X
X X
The two in front did not move, while the two in the back moved up
beyond them for about that much distance. The recommended
separation between team members is between four to six squares, and
the normal leap frog distance is about that much as well. That
way, when one person spots a target, most likely every one will be
able to see and fire at the target. The two who stayed in place
should turn around and face out and/or back to prevent rear
attacks. Keep plenty of TUs for opportunity fire.
5.2.4 Use the terrain!
Use whatever advantage terrain can give you. Hide behind things,
use secondary explosions or fires, etc. Also see 5.2.5.
If enemy is standing next to some volatile objects (fuel drum in
Hangar, purple command console in UFO room or base, etc.), shoot
the object instead of the alien to take advantage of the secondary
explosions. Lots of things are explosive in enemy bases. Just
make sure you are not close by when it goes...
Hide behind other aliens can be a valid tactic, if a desperate one.
Aliens do NOT check who's in their path before firing. Often they
will hit and kill their comrades as they try to shoot you. It was
reported that one alien shot itself while attempting to shoot down
the gravlift.
[KSC] Hiding behind something can be the difference between a dead
soldier versus a critically wounded solider who could be saved by a
medikit. NEVER if possible leave soldiers out in the open. Either
use up all their TUs and get under cover or don't move at all.
This also means do NOT stay in midair if you have flying suits.
Also, try to leave 4 TUs so you can kneel down. It makes you a
smaller target as well as improve your shooting accuracy.
5.2.5 Aliens are wishy-washy (alien movement pattern)
Aliens usually move forward, take a shot, then turn 180 and move
back. So, if you see them in their movement phase and don't see
them in yours, move forward a little, and you may see them. For
example, they move like this...
visible
range
|
S -----/-->S
| | YOU
S<-\---+
|
5.2.6 Leave opportunity for shots
To make opportunity shots in the enemy movement phase, you need
TU's left unused, as well as a high reactions rating (over 50
preferred). So leave enough for a shot while moving and still get
in cover, or don't move at all.
HINT: have soldiers kneeling close to UFO doors is a good way to
get better reactions, if they have plenty of TUs left to shoot any
aliens who comes out. This is great against Muton UFOs, as Mutons
tends to come out and go back in the doors a lot.
5.2.7 Use HWP as scouts
HWP's, especially the Hovertanks, are great scouts. They have 70
to 100 TU's, nice firepower, plenty of health, and are immune to
alien psi attacks. On the other hand, they ARE expensive, they do
NOT gain experience, and they are four space units.
Don't make kills with HWP's. Their job is to SEE the enemy so the
human members can then fire at them, even when it's beyond THEIR
visual range.
5.2.8 Deny cover to the enemy
The rocket tank and perhaps the Fusion Ball Hovertank are great for
taking down buildings and walls, denying aliens places to hide.
You can also use grenades and rocket launchers, or auto-cannon with
explosive / incendiary ammo.
[Hint] There's no penalty for destroying civilian property, so go
ahead and blast all the houses into pieces if you have to, just to
get that last alien on the map. Of course, don't kill any
civilians in the process.
[Counterpoint] While this is a game, it's NOT nice to destroy an
entire building just to wipe out one last alien... X-COM is a
COVERT organization, not the "Dirty Pair"...
(For those of you who don't know "The Dirty Pair", they are a pair
of Japanese Anime characters, who are supposed to be trouble-
shooters but usually ended up wrecking the place they
troubleshoot... :-)
You can also use guns in the process. Lasers, consuming no ammo,
are great in this role.
5.2.9 Listen to the sounds in alien movement phase
The sounds in alien movement phase can reveal important clues to
alien locations. Normal door clicking means the aliens are near a
regular building (farm house, etc.) Hydraulic door sounds means
the automatic doors were used. Two sounds close together means
someone just went in and immediately came back out (or vice versa).
COROLLARY : the length of the alien movement phase is also
proportional to the number of aliens left on the map. (Remember
that stunned aliens or civilians can wake up!)
5.3 Weapon Tactics
Different weapons should be used differently and in different
circumstances. Here are some suggestions on how to best employ the
different weapons.
5.3.1 Pistols and Rifles
Use them only when you have to, sniper style. Dump them for lasers
as fast as possible. They use clips and doesn't do much damage.
They may be enough to use against Sectoids, who has little armor,
but not against tougher enemies.
5.3.2 Heavy Cannon
More accurate than the auto-cannon and slightly more damage, but a
lot less effective with only six shots and no auto-fire mode. I'd
rather use the auto-cannon.
5.3.3 Auto-Cannon
Probably the most effective weapon in the early game, with auto
mode, three types of ammo, and 14 shot magazine. Still, 14 shots
is not much in auto-mode, and three magazines can run out on you
pretty quick. It is also HEAVY. Of course, auto-fired HE rounds
can clear a forest REAL quick.
5.3.4 Rocket Launcher
Rocket Launcher packs your biggest punch in the early game, and
being an area weapon makes it invaluable in dealing with nasty
Reavers and other loathsome creatures. On the other hand, you can
only carry three of them, and they only fly in straight lines.
Have another member carry reloads for you.
5.3.5 Laser Pistol, Laser Rifle, and Heavy Laser
Forget the heavy laser. The 35% more damage that it does is offset
by having no auto mode and decreased accuracy. You can probably
forget the pistol also, but you need to research it to get laser
rifle. Laser rifle is arguable the best squad weapon in the game,
needing no ammo, with decent accuracy and damage.
5.3.6 Grenades and High Explosive
Get alien grenades when you can, but regular grenades would do.
Use them to flatten small buildings and take down walls so aliens
have nowhere to hide.
[NET] Proximity grenades should be used to block off doors and
stuff so nothing can sneak up behind you. They appear to have a 2-
square blast radius and 1-square sensing radius, so do NOT throw
them next to the door! Throw them one square away from the door so
the alien have to come out before it blows up. For example:
(D=Door P=Proximity Grenade A=Alien)
Alien just behind door, does NOT trigger the grenade since not in
radius of 1
|
AD P
|
Alien steps through the door, and BOOM!
|
DAP
|
I haven't found smoke grenades to be that useful. I've tried it in
covering my deployment, but it doesn't seem to work that well.
I've yet to use any high-explosive in any of the games I played,
but [NET] has reported that they are very useful taking out
Cyberdiscs in tight urban settings, due to larger blast area.
5.3.7 Plasma Pistol, Plasma Rifle, and Heavy Plasma
Forget the plasma pistols. Plasma Rifle and Heavy Plasma are good
weapons, and the heavy-plasma is the only heavy weapon in the game
with auto mode. On the other hand, Heavy Plasma is "heavy" and
normal soldier can't carry it very well.
Heavy Plasma should only carried by a few select members, due to
possible shortages in clips. Also, with only 80 items per craft,
having so many clips around can be a problem.
Heavy Plasma can punch through inner walls of UFOs when auto-fired
a couple times, useful for pincer attacks.
5.3.8 Blaster Launcher
Blaster launcher is probably one of the greatest weapons in the
game. It is expensive, its ammo is expensive, but it is VERY
useful. You can blow up things in ANY direction, turn around
corners, go up and down stairs, flatten entire barns, even punch a
hole in UFO's outer hull! With a bit of management one solider can
carry up to 5 reloads (2 on belt and 3 in backpack).
[NET] One trick is to leave the soldier and the launcher inside the
craft kneeling on top of the ammo on the floor. That way there's
more than 5 rounds available. Or you can have other soldiers carry
more ammo, drop them on the ground, then have the launcher guy
stand/kneel on top of them. You can use this trick on rocket
launcher too, but it's not as useful.
[NET] When attacking battleships, consider using a blaster bomb to
blow open one of the engine "legs" and go up through that instead
of through that large central elevator. That way you don't have to
worry about attacks from 4 directions. You can also blow open
other parts of UFO and go in that way instead of through the door.
[KSC] Use blaster bomb to enlarge a standard door so you can fit a
tank through by targetting the wall next to the door. You can also
try this with heavy plasma as those can sometimes punch through
walls. This is great for battleships since the large central lift
allows tanks to go up to any level.
5.3.9 Small Launcher
This is the only weapon that gives you standoff stun capability.
Get this when you need to stun aliens. Try to back this up with a
regular weapon. Stun damage counts against alien's health, and a
hit can drop its health low enough so it gets stunned.
5.4 Assault tactics
* Your first priority is to make sure no aliens can ambush you as
you deploy. This makes HWP invaluable as they are often the
first ones to exit the craft, saving your soldiers from getting
shot. They also take several hits, even from heavy plasma,
before being destroyed.
* Your second priority is to scout and clear out the map of any
stray aliens, while locating your primary objective. When
boarding UFOs, the objective is the UFO itself. When attacking
alien base, the objective is the alien command center. Spread
out into fire teams of two soldiers or one soldier and one HWP
and search. One team should guard the entrances to the
objective when found.
* Your third priority is to secure the objective. Leave a team
guarding the entrance to the objective in case the perimeter
sweep missed somebody.
5.4.1 Use a "scout" to open the door
There should be one person whose specialty is open doors so that
other people can shoot through the open door. The person with the
best reaction and most TUs should get this job.
* 5.4.2 Look "over the top" if the top's open
[SCOHN] Some of the small or medium UFO that has been shot down
have their tops blown open. Throwing some grenades into that
opening can help you clean up any more aliens left inside. There's
not that much equipment left in there any way.
[KSC] If you have flying suits, you may want to go up to the upper
level and see if you can see any one while standing on the edges.
Four of you at separate corners can set up a great cross-fire
pattern and fry / stun any aliens left inside.
[NET] On larger UFOs you may want to OPEN a hole from the top with
a blaster launcher. Also see 5.3.8. Many people have reported
more success cleaning the UFO from the TOP down instead of bottom
up, esp. battleships.
5.4.3 Aliens have no manners [open doors]
Unpowered doors do not close by themselves. Therefore, if you spot
an open door and you know you didn't open it, there must be an
alien nearby! See also 5.2.9.
5.4.4 Look up!
[KSC] On multi-level UFO and bases, you can sometimes see enemies
at the upper level near grav-lifts. Multi-level UFO's with floor
pieces destroyed will also allow you to look up into the higher
level. If you see someone, ATTACK FIRST!
[KSC] Remember to look at the upper level (view level up button),
since sometimes you may have walked by the ceiling hole without
realizing it. Also, watch the blast patterns in the floor and
check the center of the blast pattern and turn around to look up.
5.4.5 Use your blaster bombs!
Blaster bombs shoot around corners and up/down grav-lifts as well
as opening up walls and stuff, so use them! Blasting new doors are
great. Just remember not to bunch up so the aliens can do the same
thing to you. You can do the similar things with Fusion Hover
tanks but those have weaker warhead. See also 5.3.8.
5.4.6 Use your windows in the craft!
[CGR/CGW] Your craft have windows, so turn your rearmost soldiers
or HWPs around and take a look. This will let you know the general
terrain layout before you even get out of the transport.
5.4.7 In base, find Central Command!
Usually the base commander does not move from their two level
command center, with a corridor all around, windows on the
corridor, and a VERY large gravlift in the middle. It is very
distinctive. If you can find it, and watch your back while doing
so, you can probably setup ambushes all around as other aliens
converge on you and head into the trap. Just don't bunch up and be
blasterbomb bait.
5.5 Capturing aliens
Capturing aliens will yield a lot of information, especially the
medics, engineers, and leaders. Alien commanders (who are only in
bases or base-establishing UFOs) are the only ones that can give
you clues on how to WIN the game once and for all, so capturing
aliens are very important.
5.5.1 Build Alien Containment first!
Without "Alien Containment", any aliens you capture DIE upon your
arrival at the base. So build alien containment as your FIRST
improvement. Add alien containment to all strike bases, since
prisoners are ONLY brought back to that strike team's home base.
5.5.2 How do I capture aliens?
There are three ways you can capture aliens : you can shoot them
and hope you only knocked them unconscious (i.e. they did NOT
scream as they collapsed); you can use stun rods on them; or you
can use stun bombs on them. Sometimes you will need combination of
all three. NOTE: You cannot stun a Cyberdisc or a Sectopod. Those
are robots, and stun charges destroy them instead.
5.5.3 WHO do I capture?
You want specialists like leaders, medics, and engineers over
common soldiers or terrorists. Specialists can give you more
information like UFO stats and specie information. Leaders and
Commanders can give you special information that will eventually
lead to the final battle, and only Ethereals and Sectoid leaders /
commanders can give you Psi Power.
HINT: You can use a mind probe on aliens to identify their rank
while they are still standing.
HINT: you can also stun them then try to pick them up, which will
also identify their rank. [Stuart Lamble]
5.5.4 Double-team them!
Capturing, as in all fighting, requires a backup. If one fails you
get another chance. This is especially important with stun rods
since you must go up right next to the alien. Failing that, save
enough TUs to get back to cover and hope the alien doesn't come
after you or your buddies will cover you.
5.5.5 Using Stun Rods
You should sneak up from behind to use Stun Rods. Have one guy in
front to keep its attention, while another sneak up behind it and
ZAP! This works best in the large scout UFOs (the one that looks
like a plus sign) when there are TWO doors leading to the "bridge".
You can also use this on panicked aliens or aliens that just shook
off your mind control. HINT: Use a Mind Probe on the alien to see
if it has enough TU's to fire back at you.
5.5.6 Using Stun Bombs
Stun bombs frequently requires several shots in order to
incapacitate one, but they are effective over an area. So if you
have several aliens close to each other, one bomb can stun multiple
aliens. Try to fire between them.
If an alien got hit by a stun bomb and does not drop, have someone
take a snap shot at it. If the shot hits and does not kill it,
it'll probably drop unconscious.
5.5.7 Do NOT stun Mind-Controlled Aliens [?]
Anyone know how this works on the Amiga version ?
[Not Verified] Aliens under your mind control may NOT count as
captured when you stun them since they are technically on your
side. You MUST wait until they are no longer under mind control
before stunning them for the program to count them as "captured".
(Can someone try to verify this?)
5.5.8 It won't fit, lame double-brain! (Anti-Reaver tactic)
When under attack by Reavers, hide in a house with a single-space
door. The Reaver, being a 4-space creature, cannot go through the
door, and being a HTH attacker, cannot attack you through the door
or window. You can then jab it with stun rods or any weapon you
feel like using. Just don't... No, not the wall! Aieee!!!!!
5.6 Psi / Anti-Psi Tactics
Ethereal and Sectoid leaders can conduct psi attacks on your
soldiers. To get psi powers yourself, see 6.0 Research. You will
need to train your own soldiers in order to identify those with
most psi potential and then further training to bring them up to
speed. You will also need psi amp to conduct your own psi attacks.
Once mastered, psi attacks are very powerful. Here are some
suggestions in using and countering psi attacks.
5.6.1 Cause Panic
Aliens who panic usually drop their weapons, and since they never
pick them back up, this makes them a lot less dangerous (except for
the enemy that use HTH attacks). Cause panic can also cause
berzerkness, which can help you eliminate aliens nearby that alien,
especially when the things it hit cause secondary explosions...
:-) Cause panic is also more likely to succeed than mind control.
5.6.2 Access Mind-Controlled Enemy Inventory [Cheat / Bug]
If you mind-controlled an alien, you may have noticed that you
cannot access their inventory by clicking on the person icon.
However, there is still a way: go through YOUR soldiers' inventory,
THEN use the scroll buttons to scroll over! The alien will show up
as a squad member with no armor, but with name of Race and Rank,
like "Ethereal Soldier". You can drop/move their inventory like
this instead of throwing.
5.6.3 Use mind-controlled aliens as scouts
Mind controlled aliens should be used to go where you do NOT want
to go personally. If you want it to shoot, keep the weapons.
Otherwise, drop them. Use them to open doors is much safer than
using one of your own.
5.6.4 Sack your psi-weaklings and cowards
Sack any rookies with bravery under 40-50. They will panic first
in combat. Once you have psi labs, sack rookies with the lowest
psi strengths and train only those who have the highest psi
strengths. Save the psi-weak veterans for attacks that you know do
not involve psi-active races. This is another reason not to equip
crafts until you know for sure about the mission.
5.6.5 Check for signs of mind control
When an alien attempts to mind control your troop you'll see the
signs. If the control did not succeed, have that soldier drop
his/her weapons immediately and kneel. That way if s/he was taken
over, little harm could be done. If you got the alien you can
always have the soldier pick up the weapon again.
HINT: panicked aliens and mind controlled soldiers NEVER EVER pick
up dropped weapons.
5.7 Different shots and different weapons
Which shot to take from which weapons depends a lot on the tactical
situation involved. Any shot, no matter hit or not, can alert the
enemy who may turn around and let loose some shots (if alien is
still alive after the shot) by opportunity fire. Here's some
general guidelines.
5.7.1 When to use auto-shot
[KSC] Auto shot fires three rounds, but is the least accurate of
the three shots. On the other hand, when you use the laws of
probability, you actually come out ahead using an auto-shot, since
each shot is calculated independently. For example, let's say
chance of hitting in auto shot is 25%. The chance of getting at
least one hit out of three is 1-(chance of no hits). Chance of 25%
hit prob AND no hit in three tries is 0.75*0.75*0.75=0.42. Chance
of getting at least one hit is then 1-0.42 which is 0.56, or 56%,
much better than 25% and probably higher than the snap shot
probability. When accuracy improves, you simply increase your
chances of hitting the target multiple times, which ensures a kill.
[Doug] I disagree. I believe auto shots are useless unless
* You are standing next to the alien
* You have a cannon with HE and wants to clear the area
5.7.2 When to use snap shot or aimmed shot
[KSC] Personally, I only use snap/aimmed shot when:
* I don't need the three shot overkill
* There is something close or beyond the target I do NOT want hit,
like an exploding object, or I only want the target hit once
* I only have enough TUs to take a snap shot
5.7.3 Pistol versus Rifle debate
[Doug] I like pistols because:
* pistols are accurate enough at close range
* since they are one-hand weapons, you can carry something in the
other hand without messing up your aim, good for specialists
* shots take less TUs than rifles, thus more possible shots
[KSC] On the other hand:
* they require a separate type of ammo (unless you are using laser
pistols) which counts against your 80 item limit
* they usually do not have auto mode (again, exceptions) which
means the enemy can conduct opportunity fire / reaction fire
* they don't cause that much damage, even if they hit
[Consensus] All weapons have their place... Weight the decrease in
accuracy of a rifle but increased damage versus the pistol, which
has more accuracy (maybe) but less damage
5.9 Misc. Ground Combat Questions and Answers
* Why do I lose ammo that I never use?
After combat all clips loaded in weapons are lost, whether or not they have
been used (not a great piece of design!). Thus you should unload any weapons
that uses valuable ammo before the battle ends. See "How do I UNLOAD ammo
from a weapon?" [SCOHN] You can tell when the battle is almost over by
judging how long the alien movement phase takes.
* How do I reload weapons?
Make sure you have enough time units [SCOHN : You do NOT have to have the
other hand free.] Drop ammo into weapon. You should hear a "reload" click.
Click on the weapon in hand and it will tell you what type of ammo and how
many shots are left.
How do I UNLOAD ammo from a weapon?
Keep the other hand empty. Click on the weapon and drop it on the UNLOAD
icon to the right of the screen (just under the OK and the scroll arrows).
The ammo cartridge should be in the other hand.
* Some of my soldiers have TU's used before I moved them. Why?
[KSC] You "overloaded" them. They have low strength yet you gave them too
many things or things too heavy to carry, which decreases their TUs. Give
them something lighter to carry. [SCOHN/KSC] On the other hand, soldiers
gain strength by carry heavy stuff... So if there isn't much danger, train
the "weak" soldiers by by giving them heavy stuff to carry and running them
back and forth around the landing craft. They'll gain some strength when the
battle's over. (Imagine a drill sergeant conducting training under live
fire! :-D )
Why should I need grenades when I have auto cannon?
[FAQ] An autocannon has very impressive firepower. However it is heavy to
carry (strength 40+ recommended). A soldier equipped with a laser rifle can
carry a couple of grenades and use them to flatten small buildings or other
targets without needing a bulky cannon.
How can I fire on aliens in their movement phase?
You can carry out opportunity fire on aliens as they move. Leave enough TU's
after your move for at least a snap shot, then if your trooper saw an alien
and has good enough reactions s/he will fire at the alien. Use the 4 icons
near the bottom left of screen to reserve the TUs. Rookies typically will
not fire unless you leave them with more than half of their TUs.
What's with troops missing in action (MIA)?
If one of your troopers in under alien control at the end of a battle (s)he
counts as MIA; therefore try to wait until (s)he is no longer in control
before finishing off aliens. (This would be a bug since there's no one to
control him/her any more!) Another way to get people MIA is try to take off
(abort mission) with only an unconscious person in the transport. You'll
lose that person as MIA as well as the transport. HINT: use MediKit to wake
them up (stimulant) then march them in. See next.
How do I wake up unconscious soldiers?
[SCOHN / KSC] Stand over unconscious solider, use Medi-Kit, apply one shot of
stimulant. Check inventory. If the "Body" is still on the ground, repeat.
When the "body" is no longer there, move away. The soldier should be
standing at that square next turn. S/he may need further treatment, see
below. You should HEAL any fatal wounds first as those decreases health per
turn, and may cause the soldier to fall unconscious again.
How do I use Medi-Kit?
Stand next to the soldier you need to heal (except for unconscious, see
above), medikit in hand, select use. If healing, click on part in red to
show number of fatal wounds in that area, then apply one dose per wound.
Fatal wounds must be HEALed since they decrease health per turn (bleeding?)
and can kill a soldier. You can also add painkiller to raise morale. EACH
dose dispensed costs 10 TUs. See UFOpedia for applications.
How do I open doors?
[KSC] Target your soldier to move to the "square" behind the door and (s)he
will then automatically open it (using some TUs). HINT: Do not open doors
without plenty of spare TU's. Using a motion scanner will help. HINT:
Create a door! Either shoot a hole in the wall or blow up the entire wall.
How do I use motion scanner?
[KSC] Put motion scanner in one hand, select hand, select Use Motion Scanner.
It will display every movement for a radius of 9 around you. The more
movement (includes your side also), the larger the blip on the scanner. The
central arrow is your facing, North is top.
How do I use Mind Probe?
[KSC] Keep the alien visible to at least one of your soldiers (does NOT have
to be the one holding the Mind Probe). Put Mind Probe in hand, select use.
Click cursor on the alien (make sure the cursor square is blinking). You
will see the alien's stat graph screen (TU's, armor, etc.) and their type and
rank (ex: Sectoid Engineer).
* How do I use the Blaster Launcher/Bomb or Fusion Hovertank?
When you select Launch Missile, you can specify a series of up to 9
"waypoints" which can go around any thing, climb and dive, even fly in
circles. The final waypoint is the explosion point, UNLESS it runs into
something solid first. Remember that a blaster bomb can actually miss, so
keep everyone WELL CLEAR of the flight path!!!!! When you are finished
plotting, click LAUNCH, then enjoy the fireworks! Program it with two or
more waypoints to avoid the one-shot blaster launcher bug. See 1.5.
How do my soldiers improve?
By doing things. They improve firing accuracy by shooting at things,
strength by carrying more things, and so on. There is no concensus on
whether using psi attacks improves one's psi talent yet. Those getting kills
will improve more than those who did not. Therefore, try not to let HWP get
a kill since you will lose a chance to let a soldier improve, and leave the
easy shots (against panicked aliens, for example) to the rookies.
6.0 Research and Manufacture Strategies
6.1 What should I research?
Here are the research trees that shows detailed progression.
Laser Weapons Heavy Heavy Plasma Plasma
| Plasma Plasma Clip Rifle Rifle Clip
Laser Pistol |___________| |__________|
| | |
Laser Rifle | |
| |__________OR___________|
Heavy Laser |
| |
Laser Cannon Plasma Cannon
(Laser Tank) (Hovertank/Plasma)*
| |
Laser Defense Plasma Defense
Alien Alloys Blaster Blaster
| Launcher Bomb
Elerium 115 Personal Armor UFO Power Source |___________|
|_____________|_________________| |
| Fusion Ball
| (Hovertank/Launcher)*
Power Suit UFO Navigation |
|_________________| Fusion Defense
|
Flying Suit
Alien Elerium UFO UFO
Alloys 115 Power Source Navigation
|___________|___________|______________|
|
UFO Construction
V
V
New Fighter Craft
(Firestorm) * = [Hovertank / Plasma]
|
New Fighter-Transporter
(Lightning)
__________|____________
| |
Grav Ultimate Craft
Shield (Avenger)
* You need "New Fighter Craft" before you can build the hovertanks. You need
fusion ball launcher before you can build the fusion ball hovertank.
6.2 Suggested Research Priorities
* [KSC] First, get laser weapons ASAP, then go down the list to
laser rifle, No need to go further than that on that tree
* [Doug] laser cannon is a GREAT money maker, See A.8
* Get alien alloy researched ASAP so you can build personal armor,
which will increase your survival rate substantially. Research
and build any armor that you come across ASAP.
* Do not research medikits until you get at least personal armor,
and probably power suit, because before then, one hit will
usually kill you, giving you no chance to use medikits
* You need better weapon and armor initially more than you need
anything else. Concentrate research on weapons.
* While plasma rifle is lighter, skip it and research heavy plasma
since you would need the extra firepower. The "weaker" members
can carry laser rifles instead or get some exercise
* Research plasma beam immediately after you finish researching
the plasma weapons. Plasma beams make interceptors much more
effective and lowers its operating cost (no missile reloads)
* Research small launcher/stun bomb and blaster launcher / blaster
bomb when you get them (but not top priority). They are nice to
have, but not essential until need to capture live aliens for
more research and fights in alien bases
* Motion sensor is great for ground assaults, allowing you to see
behind walls and doors
* Mind Probe is very useful in IDing aliens for possible capture
6.3 Research Strategies
* Do not research the same thing at different bases, there is no
benefit; the research is independent at each base (as is
manufacturing).
* Gang-research each topic. If you have 50 scientists, do NOT
spread them into 5 topics of 10 each. Assign all 50 to one
topic. Assign ALL scientists you have to ONE task. You'll
finish each faster overall.
* Add scientists whenever you can. You will probably be limited
to about 50-100 scientists only, but add more if you can. Add
scientists up to the maximum your living quarters can permit.
6.4 Research Cheat [Verified]
If you have more than one research site, arrange transfer of
scientists and/or engineers JUST before the end of the month so
that they will arrive next month (check transfer times). Since
salaries are deducted at the end of month for scientists/engineers
at each base, no salary is paid... Saving you a TON of cash!
6.5 Manufacture Strategies
* Remember that item(s) being built uses up some workshop space,
so do not hire 50 engineers just because you have 50 open
workshop space. You may end up with a couple engineers sitting
on their hands doing nothing.
* Always keep your engineers busy building something. Never let
them sit idle. You need to keep them around in case of new
manufacturing needs, but in the meanwhile they should earn their
money's worth. See A.8 for things to make.
7.0 Logistics and Material Management
7.1 Why is Elerium important?
It is a power source NOT native to the Solar System. You need it
to build most alien things such as UFO power source, stun bombs,
plasma clips, and more. In addition, the UFO-style crafts you get
use Elerium for fuel. Since you cannot make it yourself, it is a
very scarce and valuable commodity.
7.1.1 Where can I get Elerium then?
Each intact engine captured can yield about 50 or so units of
Elerium. Bases can contain more.
Consider cautious attack in order to preserve the UFOs condition
upon crash landing, or chase them until they land and keep
attacking the landed ones only. Consider leaving one alien base
alone and attack the landed supply ships just for Elerium.
[NET] In UFO V1.0, if aliens attack your base and fail, you will
get thousands of units of Elerium. This is no longer true in UFO
V1.2 and XCOM.
7.1.2 How can I save Elerium?
* In the air, use Interceptors only (they have longer range any
way) with Avalanche missiles and lasers. Do not use the modern
crafts, which needs Elerium for fuel.
* [Possible Cheat] keep redirecting the craft in the air means the
craft can keep flying even at 0% fuel
* Plasma beam seems to need no Elerium (only when built).
* On the ground, use captured equipment and laser weapons only.
* Unload the clip before the battle ends so you keep the clip for
a free refill.
* Never sell any Elerium-based stuff that you MAY need or Elerium
itself. Build stuff that requires elerium only grudgingly.
(Sell extra clips since they count toward 80-item limit!) You
capture lots more on each mission any way.
7.2 I keep running out of funds! What do I do?
There are three ways to make money:
1) The sponsoring countries pay you each month if you keep them
smiling. They may even increase payments if you make them REAL
happy (i.e. get a good score) See 7.2.1. On the other hand,
the amount they pay is quite little compared to your profits...
2) You can sell off excess alien artifacts for money. One raid on
a large UFO can net a million bucks or more. See 7.2.2 on what
to sell and what not to sell.
3) You can sell off stuff that you manufacture. This is one way
to make the engineers earn their salary when they are idle.
See A.8 for a profitability analysis.
7.2.1 How do I keep sponsors happy?
* Intercept UFOs over their country
* Shoot those UFOs down (thus discouraging further UFO presence)
* Board UFOs and capture artifacts, live aliens, and dead bodies with
little or no casualties (score you get at end of mission)
* Attack terror sites and minimize civilian / XCOM casualties
* Destroy alien bases on Earth
* Prevent destruction of your own bases
* Successfully research and apply alien technology
You can see your score in the graphs screen. (Unfortunately there
is no breakdown like the after-battle report) You can see your
current funding levels in the Funding screen.
7.2.2 What alien artifacts should I sell?
For non-weapon items, keeping one should be enough, since you only
need one artifact for your scientists to research, so sell off the
rest. Alien Entertainment, Food, and others are of no use to you
except for research value. Don't bother researching those until
you have nothing else to do, just sell them.
Sell off all the alien bodies unless you need one for research,
which probably won't happen till near the end. It's interesting to
know, but not essential to the win. So just sell those bodies and
research live aliens only.
7.2.3 What alien artifacts should I NOT sell?
Never sell any Elerium. Practically every "useful" alien artifact
that can be manufactured requires Elerium. Besides, it doesn't
sell for much.
Never sell any ammo that you may use unless you have plenty more.
If you have 10 heavy plasmas, then you should keep between 15 and
20 HP clips. Blaster bombs and stun bombs are harder to find and
usually have to be manufactured, so save those while you can.
On the other hand, do NOT keep too much extra stuff because you
need the cash. If you only have 10 soldiers, you don't need twenty
rifles. Keep just enough weapons and ammo for the soldiers, plus
grenades. Remember crafts and base have SEPARATE storage... So
you may have double the amount you think you do.
7.2.4 What manufactured objects should I sell?
Laser Cannon. See table A.8 for an in-depth analysis in the
profitability of any manufactured object. While Fusion Bomb
Hovertank has a bit more net profit, it needs Elerium.
7.3 Dealing with Equipment Shortages
No equipment? Running out of equipment? Here's some hints and
tips on how to deal with that.
7.3.1 What is "Not Enough Equipment to Re-Equip Squad"?
Your base does not have enough inventory to keep the same amount of
the equipment the team had previously onboard the craft before the
mission. For example, you had 16 grenades on the Skyranger. You
used up 4 on the mission, but the base only has 3 left, so base
cannot reprovision you to the original stock of 16. SOLUTION:
Stock up a bit more at the base.
7.3.2 I bought HWP's but I can't use them!
Did you get them a full load of ammo? You cannot put HWP's onboard
crafts unless you have enough ammo for each (automatically loaded).
HWPs except Laser Tanks and Plasma Hovertanks require ammo. Cannon
Tank needs 30 shells, Rocket Tank needs 8 rockets, and Fusion
Hovertank needs 8 HWP Fusion Balls. Always keep twice or more in
stock, especially HWP Fusion Balls (which must be built).
7.3.3 I keep running out of missiles for crafts!
[KSC / FAQ] If you ran out of money also, use weapons that doesn't
use ammo, like plasma beam and laser cannons. On the other hand,
Avalanche is cheap at 9000 each and has a good punch, so stock up
on those, keep 4 times capacity around. For example, Avalanche
launchers holds 3 each, so Avalanche stock should be 12 per
Avalanche launcher. If it doesn't fit, add a General Stores.
7.4 When to sack / retire things
[KSC] Crafts that were too heavily damaged (i.e. over 50%) should
be sacked and a new one hired, unless it must be manufactured and
you are short on money, time, or materials. Repair time may be too
long. That's one more reason to keep your engineers busy...
[KSC] Rookies and squaddies who have not improved much yet were
wounded heavily should be sacked / discharged and money spent on a
new recruit. Remember that you still pay for each soldier even
when they are in the hospital recuperating. Of course, you can try
using the Transfer Trick to avoid paying for them...
7.5 Equipping Landing Crafts
There's an 80-item limit on what you can take with you per craft,
no matter it's a Skyranger or Avenger. Here's a couple tips on
getting the most out of those 80 items:
7.5.1 Use Laser Weapons
[CGW / KSC] Laser Weapons require no ammo, eliminating a large
number of items. Assuming two clips per weapons, 8 plasma rifles
vs. 8 laser rifles means 16 less items (2 clips each assumed). Of
course laser rifles are about 33% less powerful, but 16 more items
means you can take along more grenades and other things.
* 7.5.2 Bring uniform weapons
Don't bring both pistols and rifles, since they cannot use the same
ammo and adds one more item into the equation. Bringing one more
clip for one or the other is better.
7.5.3 Bring less misc. equipment
[KSC] You do not need a Medi-Kit on each person, just on designated
medics. You also don't need mind probes, motion detectors, and psi
amps on every one, just the specialists. Remember to have a backup
or two for each.
[Doug] I disagree slightly. Having a medi-kit on everyone means
more immediate treatment is available instead of waiting for the
medic to get to you. At the minimum carry one kit per 2 soldiers.
7.5.4 Bring HWP's
HWP's is just one item, yet it has lots of firepower, and ammo is
included. Of course, you need to trade 4 spaces on the craft for
it, but that means you bring less soldiers who would need less
items, giving you even MORE itms savings.
7.5.5 Don't fight at night
Fighting at night means electro-flares, and those take up a lot of
the 80 items. So don't fight at night. Fighting at night is also
a major pain any way.
9.0 Misc. questions and answers
How do I win the game?
The ultimate aim of XCOM is to research (interrogate) live aliens to find out
where they are coming from and why. Grab an alien commander in an alien
base. Once you interrogate a commander you should get a big clue!
I still don't understand... How do I beat the aliens?
*sigh* Basically, you need to research Alien Origins, The Martian Solution,
then Cydonia or Bust. As you finished research on each, READ the text. See
A.2 for more information.
Why do I never see any large UFOs?
On missions like retaliation, base and terror, small ships scout before the
large ship comes in. If you destroy the scouts, no large ships will appear.
Why do my soldiers rarely get promoted?
To have promotions after battle you need to have a certain number of troops
around all your bases for the promotion to be possible. There can be only
ßone commander in all XCOM. [KSC] These numbers appears to be based on the
number of soldiers XCOM has EVER HAD, rather than soldiers in employment.
Rank Sergeant Captain Colonel Commander
Troops needed 5 11 23 30
[Manual] HINT: Try to spread the officers out into different teams. Troops
led by officers have higher morale and is less susceptible to panic, unless
the officer is killed.
In the Soldier's stats, what's with the 2 colors on the bars?
The dark color was the soldier's ORIGINAL stats, when s/he first arrived at
XCOM. The lighter colors are the stats s/he gained since then. HEALTH bar
is a little different. The health bar have red indicating current health,
with a pink outline denoting original health. The WHITE bar that overlays
the red bar sometimes is the "STUN" bar. When the white bar reaches over the
red bar, the person drops unconscious. The white bar can go up from smoke
inhalation or getting hit by stun weapons. The red bar drops from taking
damage.
XXXX has signed a pact with the aliens! Can I get them back?
Net has conflicting reports on this questions. Some have reported that if
you patrol that country aggresively, shoot down all UFO you see closeby,
eliminate any alien bases in that country, and so on, it may came back after
a few months. Others have reported that this tactic does not seem to work.
It may be related to difficulty level.
I've grabbed an alien commander. Now how do I go to Cydonia?
Read the text that goes under Cydonia or Bust carefully. If you do
everything right, select that craft to intercept, and on the top next to
CANCEL should be a button labelled CYDONIA.
A. Appendix of Tables
Following are series of tables for XCOM. All information are in your
UFOpedia somewhere, but are presented in different forms here. The ?
items have unknown values at this revision. If you see them, please
notify the author so an update could be made.
A.1 Base Facilities
You can have up to 8 bases around the world. There are 36 (6x6)
locations in each. Only hanger takes up more than one location.
Name Days Build Cost Cost/month Usage
Access Lift 1 300k 4k (Entrance to underground base)
Living Quarters 16 400k 10k (Sleeps 50)
Laboratory 26 750k 30k (Allows 50 research)
Workshop 32 800k 35k (Allows 50 manufacture)
Small Radar 12 500k 10k (300nm range, 5% detect/10mins)
Large Radar 25 800k 15k (450nm range, 5% detect/10mins)
General Stores 10 150k 5k (Holds 50 units of equipment)
Alien Containment 18 400k 15k (Holds 10[!?] live aliens)
Hanger 25 200k 25k (Maintains 1 craft)
Missile Defence 16 200k 5k (Def value 500, Accuracy 50%)
Laser Defence 24 900k 10k (Def value 600, Accuracy 60%)
Plasma Defence 34 600k 12k (Def value 900, Accuracy 70%)
Fusion Defense 36 1800k 14k (Def value 1200, Accuracy 80%)
Grav Shield 38 2300k 15k (Gives defences an extra shot)
Mind Shield 33 1300k 5k (Stop aliens finding base)
Psi Lab 24 750k 16k (For troop psionics training)
Hyperwave Decoder 26 2000k 30k (To evaluate alien missions)
NOTE 1: In a workshop, the object being manufactured takes up some space. So
you will not be able to cram all 50 engineers in there.
NOTE 2: You can dismantle a facility, even when it is under construction.
Simply click on the facility, and the program will ask you do you wish to
dismantle it, select OK or Cancel.
NOTE 3: To dismantle a base, you must remove all facilities (transferring all
people and equipment elsewhere if needed) then finally remove the access lift
itself.
A.2 X-COM Crafts and Craft Weapons
Speed Acceln Fuel Weapon Hull Cargo HWPs
Skyranger 760 2 1500 0 150 14 3
Interceptor 2100 3 1000 2 100 0 0
Firestorm 4200 9 20(E) 2 500 0 0 (1)
Lightning 3100 8 30(E) 1 800 12 0 (2)
Avenger 5400 10 60(E) 2 1200 26 4 (3)
(E) Uses elerium-115 for fuel (1) new fighter
(2) new fighter/transport (3) ultimate craft
Damage Range Accuracy Reload Shots
[Start with]
Cannon 10 10 10% 2s 200
Stingray 70 30 70% 15s 6
Avalanche 100 60 100% 20s 3
[Must Research]
Laser Cannon 70 21 70% 4s 100
Plasma Beam 140 52 140% 6s 100
Fusion Launcher 230 65 230% 25s 2
NOTE 1: Match the weapon to the target. You want to force the alien to land
so you can board it and recover artifacts and prisoners, not blow it into
smithreens (though it might make you feel good)
NOTE 2: The long range weapons, like Avalanche, Plasma Beam, and Fusion Ball
Launcher, gives you advantage since UFO usually do not fire back until you
are quite close. See A.3 for UFO weapon ranges.
NOTE 3: It is possible to miss with weapons that have accuracy of over 100
percent, usually when target zooms out of range.
A.3 UFO Types
Max Hull Weapon Max Ship
Speed Damage Power Range Crew Width comment
Small Scout 2200 50 0 0 1 3 Like an Apollo capsule
Medium Scout 2400 200 20 120 6 9 1 level, small square
Large Scout 2700 250 20 272 ? 12? 1 level, like a cross
Harvester 4000 500 40 176 ? 16 3 levels, top hatch
Terror Ship 4800 1200 120 336 ? 30 2 levels, narrow top
Supply Ship 3200 2200 60 288 ? 30 3 levels
Battleship 5000 3000 140 520 ? 30 3 levels, 5 legs
Abductor 4300 500 40 160 ? 12? ?
Following floor plans are approximately 1x1. Any one want to do more?
Please send them in, and don't forget your name so I can credit you!
Legend : G = Gravlift, D = Doors, P = UFO Power
Medium Scout [KSC]
/-------\
| |
| P |
| |
\---D---/
Large Scout[KSC]
/---------\
| D |
| | |
/-----+ | +-----\
| +-------+ |
| | | |
| D P | D
| | | |
| +-------+ |
\-----+ | +-----/
|--D-| |
| D |
\---------/
Note: Typically UFO's will not fire until you are at 1/6th of the weapon's
maximum range, sometimes even less. For example, battleship usually open
fire at 70 km, and terror ships at 45 km.
Here's a Recognition Chart for air intercepts...
Small Scout 123
(Very Small) /=\
---
Medium Scout (Small) 123456789
/=======\
|_______|
Large Scout (Medium) 123456789012
(?) /===/===\===\
|___|___|___|
Harvester 1234567890123456
(Medium) (?) /---|------|---\
|---|------|---|
|---|------|---|
\---|------|---/
Terror Ship (Large) 123456789012345678901234567890
/--------------\
/------| |------\
|____________________________|
Supply Ship (Large) 123456789012345678901234567890
/--------|----------|--------\
|--------|----------|--------|
|--------|----------|--------|
\--------|----------|--------/
Battleship (Very Large) 123456789012345678901234567890
/----------------------------\
|----------------------------|
\-------==----------==-------/
|-------||----------||-------|
Abductor 1234567890123456
(Medium) (?) /---|------|---\
|---|------|---|
\---|------|---/
A.4 Ground Combat Weapons
(Accuracy / TU%)
Aimed Snap Auto Dam Type Ammo (Capacity)
Pistol 78/30 60/18 26 AP Pistol Clip (12)
Rifle 110/80 60/25 35/35 30 AP Rifle Clip (20)
Heavy Cannon 90/80 60/33 56 AP HC-AP (6)
52 HE HC-HE (6)
60 I HC-I (6)
Auto Cannon 82/80 56/33 32/40 42 AP AC-AP (14)
44 HE AC-HE (14)
48 I AC-I (14)
Rocket Launcher 115/75 55/45 75 HE Small Rocket
100 HE Large Rocket
90 I Incendiary Rocket
Laser Pistol 68/55 40/20 28/25 46 Las
Laser Rifle 100/50 65/25 46/34 60 Las
Heavy Laser 84/75 50/33 85 Las
Grenade 50 HE
Smoke Grenade 60 HE!
Proximity Grenade 70 HE
High Explosive 110 HE
Plasma Pistol 85/60 65/30 50/30 52 Plas PP clip (25)
Plasma Rifle 100/60 86/30 55/63 80 Plas PR clip (30)
Heavy Plasma 110/60 75/30 50/35 115 Plas HP clip (35)
Blaster Launcher 120/80 200 HE Blaster Bomb
Small Launcher 110/75 65/40 90 Stun Stun Bomb
Alien Grenade 90 HE
(AP = Armor piercing HE = High Explosive I = Incendiary)
Note 1 : TU cost is always a percentage of the soldier's total TUs
Note 2 : Accuracy for two-handed weapons is decrease 20% if other hand is not
empty (i.e. holding something like grenades, psi amp, etc.)
Note 3 : Accuracy is increased 10% if the soldier is kneeling, which takes
only 4 TUs, so kneel whenever you can before you fire.
A.5 Alien Information
Attack Types, strengths, and weaknesses:
Type Attacks with Resists Weakness Notes
Sectoid Weapons Leader/Commander has psi
Cyberdisc Weapons explosives Explodes when dead
Floater Weapons Flies (=flying suit)
Reaper HTH incend Two brains and hearts
Snakemen Weapons fire/heat Carries up to 50 eggs
Cryssalid HTH HE Turns humans to zombies
Zombie HTH Dies -> Cryssalid
Ethereal Weapons & Psi All have psi attack
Sectopod Weapons plasma laser Power armored robot
Muton Weapons AP Strong, work for Eths
Silacoid HTH fire/incend Works with mutons
Celatoid Venom The blob!
Average Alien Stats ------ Armor ------
TUs Ene Hea Bra Mor Rea Fir Thr Str PSt PSk Fro Lft Rgt Rer Und
Sectoid 55 90 30 80 100 65 30 60 30 ? ? 2 1 1 1 1
Reaper ??
Floater 50 90 35 80 100 50 25 60 40 - - 4 3 3 2 6
Cyberdisc 60 90 120 110 100 65 30 0 90 - - 17 17 17 17 17
Snakeman 40 80 45 80 100 45 30 65 50 - - 10 9 9 8 6
Cryssalid 110 140 95 100 100 70 0 0 110 - - 17 17 17 17 17
Zombie 40 110 85 110 100 40 0 0 85 - - 4 4 4 4 4
Ethereal 70 100 60 80 100 75 40 80 50 50 40 17 17 17 17 16
Sectopod 60 90 95 110 100 65 30 0 90 - - 70 65 65 50 45
Muton 58 90 90 80 100 60 30 60 70 - - 10 10 10 10 5
Celatoid ??
Silacoid 40 80 115 100 100 40 0 0 70 - - 25 25 25 25 5
NOTE 1: you can get info on particular alien stats by using a mind probe on
them. Leaders and commanders are 10 to 20% higher, and there appears to be
random modifiers. Sectoid Leader and Commander have Psi capabilities.
NOTE 2: The high TUs on cryssalids allows them to move a long way and often
surprise troops from behind, turning them to zombies before you can react.
When killed, zombies shed their skins to become new cryssalids.
NOTE 3: There does not appear to be a commander in the Muton base. Therefore
Commander in a Muton base could be an Ethereal!
Specialties and information possible from them:
Alien Soldier ----- Alien activity
Alien Medic ----- Species information *
Alien Navigator ----- Hyper-Wave Decoder
Alien Engineer ----- UFO stats
Alien Leader ----- The Martian Solution
Ethereal/ Sectoid Leader ----- Psi Lab -> Mind Shield/Psi-Amp
Alien Commander ----- Cydonia or Bust **
* alien medics can give information on species other than their own
** commander can be found in bases, or UFOs on Base missions, but players
have reported that only commander captured from a base can help you
research "Cydonia or Bust".
Alien Missions
Research Generally small vehicles, least threat
Harvest Great concern to governments, usually cattle abduction
Abduction Abducts humans, causes great alarm
Infiltration Infiltrates countries and try to make pact with government,
big threat as countries that sign pact cease to fund XCOM
Base Survey and establish alien base, may contain alien commander
Terror Creates terror sites when lands at city
Retaliation Scout / attack XCOM base, greatest threat
Supply Supply alien base, trail them and patrol nearby to find alien
base
A.6 Costs
All things are listed there. Those that can be purchased or cannot be
manufactured have NO Engineer-hours. Those that must be manufactured have
Engineer-hours listed. Those things that cannot be purchased nor
manufactured have only sale price listed. See also A.8.
Engineer Workshop Alien Sale
Hours Cost Space Elerium Alloys Price
[Equipment]
Stun Rod - 1260 - - - 945
ElectroFlare - 60 - - - 30?
Motion scanner 220 34k 4 - - 45600
Medikit 420 28k 4 - - 46500
Mind probe 1200 262k 4 1 - 304000
Psi amp 500 160k 4 1 - 194700
[Armor]
Personal armor 800 22k 12 - 4 54000
Power suit 1000 42k 16 5 5 310000
Flying suit 1400 58k 16 16 5 420000
[HWP]
Tank/cannon
Tank/rocket
Tank/laser 1200 500k 25 - - ?
Hovertank/plasma 1200 850k 30 30 5 980000
Hovertank/fusion 1400 900k 30 25 8 1043000
HWP fusion bomb 400 15k 25 5 8 31500
[weapons]
Pistol
Rifle
Grenade
Proximity Grenade
Smoke Grenade
High Explosive
Laser pistol 300 8k 2 - - 20000
Laser rifle 400 20k 3 - - 36900
Heavy laser 700 32k 4 - - 61000
Plasma pistol 600 56k 3 - 1 84000
Plasma pistol clip 60 2k 4 1 - 4440
Plasma rifle 820 88k 4 - 1 126500
Plasma rifle clip 80 3k 4 2 - 6290
Heavy plasma 1000 122k 4 - 1 171600
Heavy plasma clip 80 6k 4 3 - 9590
Blaster launcher 1200 90k 5 - 1 144000
Blaster bomb 220 8k 3 3 - 17028
Small launcher 900 78k 3 - 1 120000
Stun bomb 200 7k 2 1 - 15200
Alien grenade 200 6.7k 2 2 - 14850
[Crafts]
Interceptor
Skyranger
FIRESTORM 14000 400k 30 - 65 -*
LIGHTNING 18000 600k 34 - 85 -*
AVENGER 34000 900k 36 - 170 -**
[Craft Weapons]
Cannon
Stingray
Stingray Launcher
Avalanche
Avalanche Launcher
Laser cannon 300 182k 6 - - ?
Plasma beam 500 226k 8 15 - 267300
Fusion launcher 400 242k 6 - - 281100
Fusion ball 600 28k 6 4 - 53300
[Misc]
Alien alloys 100 3k 10 - - 6500
Elerium-115 - - - - - 5000
UFO power source 1400 130k 22 16 5 250000
UFO navigation 1600 150k 18 - 3 80000
Alien Surgery 20000
Alien Examination 20000
Alien Entertainment 20000
Alien Food 20000
Alien bodies 20000
* needs 1 UFO power source + 1 UFO navigation
** needs 2 UFO power sources + 1 UFO navigation
Misc. Equipment Descriptions
[Available at start]
Stun rod has a chance to render an alien unconscious with
hand-to-hand attack (i.e. go up next to it)
Electro flare Lights up area at night, thrown, can be picked up
[Must be researched]
Motion scanner detects movement in the near vicinity, even
behind doors and walls, useful when storming UFOs
or buildings
Medikit heals fatal wounds (heal), revives unconscious
(stimulate) and boosts morale (painkiller)
Elerium 115 only found on alien UFOs/bases, and needed for
many important weapons and power units
Mind probe when used on an alien tells you its stats and
rank, useful to find an alien commander or leader
Psi amp allow soldier to use psionic attacks on aliens
(attempting to cause panic or get mind control),
requires Psi training (see later)
A.7 TU Usage by Activity
Weapon Usage are listed in Section A.4 above.
Equipment Usage:
Medi-Kit 10 / dose
Mind Probe 25%
Motion Sensor 25%
Movement Usage:
Kneel/Stand 4
Go up
Go down
Turn 1 per 45 degrees
Go forward
Material Transfer Usage: (Thanks to Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein. )
From \ To! Hand ! Belt ! Shoulder ! Leg ! Pack ! Ground
--------------------------------------------------------
Hand ! - 8 10 8 14 2
Belt ! 4 - 12 10 16 6
Shoulder ! 3 10 - 12 16 4
Leg ! 6 10 10 - 18 6
Pack ! 6 12 14 16 - 10
Ground ! 8 12 12 10 20 -
A.8 Profitability study
Can the writer of this article contact me for proper credit? I got this
forwarded by Doug Osborne, who somehow got the article's header cut off...
*--- <being included file>
[ Chould someone do this for the Amiga version ?? Math ain't my strong side
here in life :-) ]
Recently, we at the XCOM Business Institute have seen numerous posts asking
"How can I make money with my spare engineers?", and boasting "I made
millions manufacturing Medikits in my basement". We at the Institute (our
motto: "If it's worth doing, it's worth analyzing to death") spent all last
night to bring you the following table.
The basic assumption is that you are willing to support a cadre of engineers
long-term in order to make a profit. Since there is a fixed amount of
workshop space overhead for a given item, I couldn't come up with an exact
profit per engineer hour. Instead, I calculated results for a hypothetical
2-workshop operation. You would get slightly better results with larger
facilities, due to the economy of scale.
Net
Work Eng Raw Sale Unit Monthly Monthly
Item Space Hrs Material Cost Price Profit Profit Profit
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Motion Scanner 4 220 - 34000 45600 11600 3765993 1275993
Medikit 4 420 - 28000 46500 18500 3146057 656057
Psi Amp 4 500 1E 160000 194700 29700 4242586 1752586
Personal Armour 12 800 4A 22000 54000 6000 491040 -
Power Suit 16 1000 5E+5A 42000 85000 - - -
Flying Suit 16 1400 16E+5A 58000 115000 - - -
Alien Alloys 10 100 - 3000 6500 3500 2343600 3600
Elerium 115 - - - - 5000 - - -
Laser Pistol 2 300 - 8000 20000 12000 2916480 376480
Laser Rifle 3 400 - 20000 36900 16900 3049098 534098
Heavy Laser 4 700 - 32000 61000 29000 2958994 468994
Plasma Pistol 3 600 1A 56000 84000 21500 2586020 71020
Plasma Pistol Clip 4 60 1E 2000 4440 - - -
Plasma Rifle 4 820 1A 88000 126500 32000 2787278 297278
Plasma Rifle Clip 4 80 2E 3000 6290 - - -
Heavy Plasma 4 1000 1A 122000 171600 43100 3078374 588374
Heavy Plasma Clip 4 80 3E 6000 9590 - - -
Blaster Launcher 5 1200 1A 90000 144000 47500 2797750 332750
Blaster Bomb 3 220 3E 8000 17028 - - -
Small Launcher 3 900 1A 78000 120000 35500 2846627 331627
Stun Bomb 2 200 1E 7000 15200 3200 1166592 -
Alien Grenade 2 200 2E 6700 14850 - - -
Mind Probe 4 1200 1E 262000 304000 37000 2202240 -
UFO Power Source 22 1400 16E+5A 130000 250000 7500 310885 -
UFO Navigation 18 1600 3A 150000 80000 - - -
Fusion Ball L'cher 6 400 - 242000 281100 39100 6836244 4396244
Fusion Ball 6 600 4E 28000 53300 5300 617768 -
Laser Cannon 6 300 - 182000 211000 29000 6760480 4320480
Plasma Beam 8 500 15E 226000 267300 - - -
Tank/Laser Cannon 25 1200 - 500000 594000 94000 4371000 2406000
Hovertank/Plasma 30 1200 30E+5A 850000 980000 - - -
Hovertank/Launcher30 1400 25E+8A 900000 1043000 - - -
HWP Fusion Bomb 25 400 5E+8A 15000 31500 - - -
The first six columns are just basic information from my version of XCOM.
(Note: I have seen posts stating that UFO has higher sale prices for some
items, notably armour!) The 'Unit Profit' column is just the sale price
minus the cost, minus the cost of any Elerium/Alloys used in manufacture. A
'-' means a unit loss, and no further analysis is necessary. The 'Monthly
Profit' column is based on an "XCOM Month" of 24*31 = 744 hours. (30 days
hath September, April, June, ... oh, forget it) The calculation is therefore
the number of engineers that can fit in two workshops times 744 times unit
profit, divided by the hours required to make one item. For example, the
monthly profit for Motion Scanners is (96)(744)(11600)/220 = $1275993.
The 'Net Monthly Profit' column is the bottom line. Monthly expenses are the
salaries of as many engineers as fit in the workshops times $25K, plus the
maintenance on 2 workshops and 2 living quarters. As you can see, Fusion
Ball Launchers are the winner, narrowly edging out Laser Cannons. A profit
can be made early in the game on motion scanners, however.
One final note: It costs roughly $7M to hire engineers and build the
facilities, so you'll need to 'borrow' some money (preferably from alien
supply ships :) to get started.
And before you ask, no, I am not an accountant. I write software for a
living. This explains any errors there may be in the table.
*--- <end included file>
---
Source: Amiga Future GTT
Shift Key Trick:
To double your weapons during combat, press the Shift key when you are attacked. However, be aware that the enemies' weapons are also doubled if the Shift key is pressed/activated when you attack. Always check that the Shift key is deactivated before attacking! 
13:00:37