«

[axident]

Originally posted by ImpNemo@Mar 28 2005, 02:06 AM
Ehh, I dont get it.




Laser Rifle___________Heavy Plasma

Acc%___TU%_________Acc%_____TU%
46%____34%___Auto ___50%_____35%
65%_____25%__Snap____75%___ 30%
100%____50%__Aimed__110%____60%

60_____________DMG___115

Ignoring that the HP has greater accuracy... and the degree that difference is depends greatly on the soilder (the more accurate the soilder the greater that accuracy gap)

Fire Auto twice.. Laser has 360 dmg potential vrs. HP 690

If you use Snap lets assume your soilder is at 75% TU, Fire Laser x3 180 vrs. HP x2 for 230

Worse for 100% TU, 240 vrs 345 (plus 10% TU for HP soilder to move, kneel, or turn to fire)

Laser gets the nod on aimed assuming full TU AND you discount movement that turn for HP, 120 potential vrs 115, otherwise again the HP has more potential

Reloading has never been a problem for me, I just never use up the clip already loaded. I can count on one hand the number of times I can remember HAVING to reload, much less a HP. Ima big fan of snap shot, so lets assume about 50% accuracy on 35 rounds, normaly higher but, anyway, 50% hit rate gets me 17 hits and on most enemies, 17 kills. From one soilder. Anything bigger, and not sectopod, gets auto fire, assume i fire twice at 50% again for simplicity, thats 3 hits for 345 dmg. I can do that for 5 anda half rounds before im low on ammo, 2 left. My problem is Im running out of things to kill at this point.

Elerium certainly isnt a problem in the late stages your talking about... even IF for some reason the baddies stop droping lots and lots of HP clips. (2 per alien most times, if not all never made certain)

Certainly have a few laser rifles on your transport for sectopods, if your people are strong enough just equip them regardless. And ofc as has been said over and over and yet again* laser pistols for your BL/psi amp boys...

But lasers greater than HP?*


Well... only for a challenge*



Speaking of which... superhuman? with lasers?? on the non bugged version???*

Your analysis is incomplete because you don't take into account alien armor factors. From the unofficial strat guide:

9.1 Average Alien Stats (on easiest level!)
------ Armor ------
TUs Ene Hea Bra Rea Fir Thr Str PSt PSk Fro Lft Rgt Rer Und
Sectoid 55 90 30 80 65 30 60 30 40 * 2 1 1 1 1
Reaper 60 90 145 80 60 0 0 90 35 - 14 14 14 14 2
Floater 50 90 35 80 50 25 60 40 - - 4 3 3 2 6
Cyberdisc 60 90 120 110 65 30 0 90 - - 17 17 17 17 17
Snakeman 40 80 45 80 45 30 65 50 - - 10 9 9 8 6
Cryssalid 110 140 95 100 70 0 0 110 - - 17 17 17 17 17
Zombie 40 110 85 110 40 0 0 85 - - 4 4 4 4 4
Ethereal 70 100 60 80 75 40 80 50 50 40 17 17 17 17 16
Sectopod 60 90 95 110 65 30 0 90 - - 70 65 65 50 45
Muton 58 90 90 80 60 30 60 70 - - 10 10 10 10 5
Celatid 70 90 70 90 40 50 0 70 60 - 10 10 10 10 10
Silacoid 40 80 115 100 40 0 0 70 - - 25 25 25 25 5

TUs = time units Ene = energy/stamina Hea = health
Bra = bravery Rea = reaction Fir = firing accuracy
Thr = throwing accuracy Str = strength PSt = Psi Strength
PSk = Psi Skill Armor = front/left/right/rear/under

* Only Sectoid leaders and commander have Psi Skill, with avg of 55.

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, depending on rank and position.
Stats are also higher on higher difficulty levels

NOTE 2: higher rank aliens also have higher "intelligence", which means
they will remember your location longer. Some alien species are
also more intelligent than others. For example, Ethereals and
Sectoids have higher intelligence than Mutons and Reapers.

Let's take a soldier with 50 accuracy, no weapon in the other hand, but not kneeling, either. Autofire with a laser rifle = 9 shots per round, max. .46 x 50 = 23% of autofire shots hit the target. Let's say the soldier fires at a sectopod's front side with all 9 shots. On average, .23 x 9 = 2.07 shots will hit the 'pod causing an average of (60 x 1.5) - 70 = 20 points of damage each (since lasers get 1.5 x damage against 'pods). That means that a 50 accuracy soldier with a laser rifle, shooting all 9 shots at the 'pod, will do about 2.07 x 20 = 41.4 damage to the 'pod per turn, assuming that the soldier doesn't die from return fire.

Now let's look at Heavy Plasma with the same soldier. You get 2 autofires and a snap snot per turn out of a HP. .5 x 50 = 25% of the autofire shots hit, or an average of 1.5 hits for that portion. Snap shot is 75% accuracy for an average of .75 x 50 = .375 hits for that portion. That totals to 1.875 hits. Plasma does only 70% as much damage against 'pods. So each hit does (.70 x 115) - 70 = 10.5 damage. 1.875 x 10.5 = 19.7 damage to the 'pod per turn.

This is an imperfect analysis because I don't know the variance of damage dealt. You sometimes do more or less than average damage (e.g., hit an alien in the head = almost certainly a kill; shoot it in the foot and it might not die, even if it has little health and almost no armor).

Anyway, I play on Superhuman, so Sectopods have even more than 70 front armor and 95 health! I try to hit the sides and back of 'pods, but that's not always possible. Against Sectopods AND ONLY SECTOPODS, laser rifles are superior to Heavy Plasma. And they BOTH suck compared to a Blaster Launcher, which does 200 damage and kills any unit in the game with a direct hit.. because I doubt that Sectopods have more than 105 armor even at the highest difficulty settings.

If you did the same analysis with, say, Ethereal, you'd find that laser rifles can't dig deep enough through Ethereal armor to reliably kill in one hit. That exposes the soldier to retaliatory Reaction fire. For instance, say you shoot a laser rifle against an Ethereal at lowest difficulty setting. 60 - 17 = 43 damage on average, against the average Ethereal's 60 health points. Not good! So if you go autofire against an Ethereal, you better hope that you get a head shot or get multiple hits, else the Ethereal will return fire if it has enough spare TUs. A Heavy Plasma that hits an Ethereal has a better chance of killing it, doing 115 - 17 = 98 damage against 60 health. So unless you get a bad damage roll (hit its foot or something), the Ethereal will die in one hit without having a chance of returning fire.


For the other guy asking for advice on beating the game on Superhuman: I just did it, with a minimum of reloads. My general advice: make an alien containment facility, start in Europe, expand to USA immediately, research laser pistol, rifle, cannon immediately. Get 50 scientists and 50 engineers, start making and selling laser cannons when you are done making laser rifles for your infantry. By February, all interceptors should have dual Avalanche launchers.

By the end of the second month, start construction on a China base. After that, try to start more bases in S Africa, Australia, and Brazil by April. Top it off with the polar bases by May. All this time, stick with 100 scientists and as many money-producing engineers as you can get. You do NOT need more than one Skyranger until March or so; as money permits, get three Skyrangers in USA, Europe, and one other base. Don't waste resources on Avengers or Lightning troop transports.

Your first critical priority is to get Firestorms with Plasma Beam. I recommend researching Heavy Plasma, then Plasma Beam, then arming interceptors with Plasma Beams. Give laser cannons or something crappy to interceptors so that they can shoot down small UFOs without destroying their valuable E-115 cargo. You also want to be able to knock down a small Ethereal UFO later in the game to stun its occupants; fighting 2-3 Ethereals is a piece of cake compared to fighting 6-7.

To finish reseach on Firestorms, get E-115, UFO Navigation, UFO Power source, UFO construction, New Fighter, etc. Make at least one Firestorm per base, and give them all 2 Plasma beams apiece. At some point you will have enough Elerium to fuel some Firestorms that only have crappy laser cannons to knock down small UFOs. That's okay. Make sure you rearm interceptors with crappy weapons before you sell them and replace them with Firestorms, else the interceptors take their plasma beams with them!!!

100 scientists is enough for the whole game as long as you don't research the silly stuff until last. Keep adding engineers and making/selling laser cannons to buy even more workshops and engineers. Stop after you get to, say, 1000 or more engineers, because quite frankly it's a pain in the behind to periodically click on each base and sell laser cannons.

While you are trying to get Firestorms, get Hyperwave by stunning a navigator. Do it with stun rods or run around the corner into an alien holding a stun bomb launcher & hope for reaction fire.

After or concurrently with Hyperwave, get psi lab ASAP to determine which soldiers you should sack; get rid of all psi-weaklings. A dangerous way to research psi lab is to capture a Sectoid leader; I prefer finding a tiny Ethereal UFO, shooting it down with laser cannons, and then charging the handful of Ethereals with stun bomb launchers.

While this is all happening, research whatever you want, like Medikits, Armor types and Avenger. At some point you will have to raid an alien base and stun a Base Commander for researching the Cydonia solution. See other posts in this thread about combat tactics inside and outside of UFOs, alien bases, and your own base.

You should have hundreds of engineers making millions of dollars per day by fall of 1999. Now you're in business. Hire 100s of soldiers at a time and sack the crappy ones. The rest, shovel them through Psi training and sack the psi-weaklings. Make Power Armor (or Flying if you have the E-115 for it), one Avenger whose first and last mission is to Mars.

As a general hint: if a mission is too tough, then just land and take off right away. You get crap for points, but you get penalized for ignoring crash sites, I think. You may have to land and immeidately take off a lot during the first few months because your rookies with inferior weapons would get roasted in some Terror missions. I hate Terror missions, because you usually have to fight at night, whereas you almost always can wait until daytime before going to any other mission.

Good luck! I finished in August, but I bet I could do July if I were willing to reload a lot, but that makes the game less fun.

[xcom freak]

Wow even I havent thought so much about the game and i have the nickname....

[Spookyfish]

Yeah, shame on you. And I thought you were cool (shakes head)...

Hehehe, just fooling around ...

The last terror site I played was awesome... I was testing out my new flying suits against some Mutons, and I kicked their asses thoroughly! My two best soldiers found about six Mutons cleaning a two-story building of civies, and so began throwing grenades and shooting into the smoke while my lesser troops surrounded the building... It was levelled to the ground, I killed two civilians myself :whistle:, but it was over in two turns following encirclement. Awesome .

Me wuvs me sum flying suits .

[PrejudiceSucks]

Actually I have just realised that we are wasting time comparing HP and Laser Rifles.

It should really be Plasma Rifles and Laser Rifles.

Heavy Plasma vs Heavy Laser.

Fine, Heavy Plasma has Auto Shot, on the other hand, two soldiers working together will beat pretty much anything with a Heavy Laser. This 'aliens turning around' rubbish is completely negated by a Heavy Laser soldier in Power Armour (who should also carry a Stun Rod) and their comrade equiped in the same way. This way if the Heavy Laser somehow doesn't kill and the creature turns around (rare as that may be) then the other soldier can snipe them down.

Pretty much nothing can take on two Heavy Laser troops. Sectopods now seem weedy and easy to kill.

Laser Rifles are not too bad when you think about it, especially compared to Plasma Rifles. They are great for 'cutting' through the walls of houses etc. in town for no cost. That is another reason why I use them over Plasma Weapons.

That's not to say that if I see a Heavy Plasma on a mission I won't at the very least drop it off in the Skyranger/Lightning so that I keep it, it's just that they are quite annoying to maintain, and as I said in my last post they are not very good for base defence.

X-Com tip for the day: If an alien looks too tough to shoot and you have TUs spare, rush it with a Stun Rod.

[Lizard]

Ok.For first time I have a question:Can stun rod stun any alien with one hit?I am playing challange,and I think I spend enought time amusing on Earth and I should make friendly visit on Cydonia :evil:
But (becouse I generally used small launchers before) I am not so experienced with stun rods as I should be...

[another_guest]

Originally posted by PrejudiceSucks@Mar 28 2005, 07:54 AM
Actually I have just realised that we are wasting time comparing HP and Laser Rifles.

It should really be Plasma Rifles and Laser Rifles.

Heavy Plasma vs Heavy Laser.

We certainly are wasting time, that's true

The comparison between laser rifles and heavy plasmas was quite logical because both have auto shot capability. And in the end it comes down to this: what weapons are you taking, out of the whole range?

I only finished the old version (so 1 difficulty level), but then I used a mix of both, approximately like this:
1/3 laser rifles to cut holes through buildings, plus stun rods (I've got the impression laser rifles are a lot lighter to carry than heavy plasmas)
1/3 heavy plasmas in those cases where lasers don't deal enough damage
1/3 stun launchers
Plus of course some additional grenades, even HE packs, 2 mind probes, psi amps.

But since I usually divided my soldiers into groups of 2 or 3, I always had some backup if I met an alien type that was resistant to a particular weapon.
Diversity

[Spookyfish]

:blink:! I've always the heavy laser to be obselete once you get your hands on heavy plasmas, or any weapon for that matter. But, I don't really see any difference between heavy plasma and laser rifle other than slightly higher accuracy.

Anyhow... Concentrated mass-fire is my key to victory. Amen for 60% accuracy auto mode . But, I can always try some heavy laser pairs and see how it turns out...

Lizard, no. The tougher aliens can usually take a few hits with the stun rod before they go down, so if I'm going for H2H combat, I make sure to pick on the ones that have already taken a hit. I've never had really good use for any stunning weapons though... Usually the things I shoot at drop to the ground unconscious so I have to shoot them again. Freaks me out :crazy:.

:eeeeeh:

DIE! STAY DEAD!

[dunkellic]

one last word to the laser rifle vs. heavy plasma thing^^

yesterday a snakeman/chrysalid ship attacked my mainbase where i just finished ti manufacture about 30 laser rifles. the game automatically equiped my soldiers with them instead of the heavy plasmas wich i normally use (and with a psy amp).

well, it was pretty hard to kill chrysalids with laserrifles (because my soldiers carried the rifle and the amp in both hands so say good bye to accuracy).
i normally prefer to MC the enemy, try to kill (while using him) some other alien, than drop the weapon and run straight to my people. (of course, controlling a chrysalid you can´t attack him without first giving him equiptment first).

normally a chrysalid won´t live long if a soldier fires in autoshotmode at him with a heavy plasma. well....this won´t work with a laser rifle...

so: if it ins´t a sectopod heavy plasma s are superior to heavy laser (autoshot, more accuracy, more damage)

[PrejudiceSucks]

Basically, the Stun Rod knocks down most aliens in one shot. Some take 2, and if you were super-determined I guess that you could probably take down a Sectopod given enough time.

On the other hand, that would be very foolish, you should Heavy Laser the suckers or hit them with a blaster bomb. Or run away after you throw HE packs at it. That always helps. Heavy Lasers I take to Terror Sites and bases, but not anywhere else.

Another_Guest, Heavy Plasma weighs the same amount as a standard earth rifle and I think that a Laser Rifle only weighs about the same. Heavy Cannons are heavy, but nowhere near as heavy as Auto Cannons. Missile Launchers and Blaster Launchers weigh slightly more than Rifles, but not much, it's really the ammunition for them that is very heavy.

And if you're stuck with having to use sucky equipment then it's your fault. Don't keep stuff in bases that you know you won't want to use. And if you were in a base you only need one or two MC guys, and they should be behind the lines anyway. It would have been better to drop the Psi-Amps and go with the improved accuracy.
Crysallids are dangerous no matter what weapon you are using, but you should always keep a row of soldiers with Stun Rods ready for such things.

[another_guest]

Always take the weapons away from stunned aliens. I don't know if they pick up any other weapons lying around though I strongly doubt it.
But usually stunning only comes in at the end of a mission, once you've reached the inner chambers of the ufo or alien base. So I haven't had much trouble with aliens awaking before the end of the mission.