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[The Fifth Horseman]

Thanks! I'll give the frameskip a shot, in my limited undestanding it shouldn't mess the graphics (...? well, you may laugh smile.gif ) up too much and if that be the case its good smile.gif[/b]

Well, it will display every other frame at Frameskip 1 - gives a minor speed boost, but the graphics aint as smooth as they used to be.

For the record, I have Dosbox running at memsize 64 or 63 MB (for another game, i.e Strike Commander), (...)[/b]

Are you sure Strike Commander needs 64 MB RAM? Most DOS games run under eight, the most demanding I know of was Fallout with 16 meg requirement.

(...) and run dosbox at 18,000 - 20,000 cycles at all times. Experience shows that this is somewhere near my computer's limits (mp3 player and other programs may stutter occasionaly) but does not start slowing the dosgame itself just then.
I just attempted a 'dynamic core', the result was a discouraging bunch of error adresses etc., i.e. it doesn't work for me. I reset the core to normal, is there any 'better' setting?
Also I checked the dosbox page, I still use 0.63 since it works, I decided NOT to upgrade right now since X-com Apoc is not specifically listed for DosBox, at least not in the 0.65 version and among the comments of 0.65-users trying to play the game there are mostly problems listed. Right decision?[/b]

Dynamic Core approximately doubles the maximum cycle count your machine can handle (exact value differs from system to system and game to game).
While it caused frequent crashing in 0.63 of DosBox, it has been heavily improved in 0.65 and does hardly ever crash anymore.
Remember that you can have multiple copies of DosBox installed on your system without any conflicts between them - so give it a try.

Gee, I could have thought of that. Dosbox .65 it is, thanks

For the RAM: Let me quote one of the programmers from the strike commander 'magazine' (more than just a handbook ) : "We weren't even sure if there'd be any computer which could cope with the demands of the game" (It's not the exact quotation but it gets the meaning across . It's a bit like what Bill Gates supposedly said once, that noone would ever need more than 500KB RAM )

When we first tried SC it lagged stupendously. Once we found the RAM setting we just boosted it to maximum taking no chances. It seemed to work so we just went on play the game, no questions asked


The frameskip is indeed.. odd. In some respect, the game is a lot faster but it reaches its limit very quickly. An airborne missle (Sirian) plus a Sirian trooper being gutted by the combined fire of 13 troopers (draw your own conclusions, I tend to bunch my troopers up too much :wallbash: ) and there we go... or rather don't, quite the opposite. Well, 0.65 coming up, thanks again


P.S.: Dynamic core does indeed work in .65 And at 40,000 cycles the game runs soooo much smoother, even without the frameskip Thanks very much!

[The Fifth Horseman]

Why are you using ground vehicles in the first place?

Well, my APCs recovered themselves after a while. I don't know how it works but stuck or semi-stuck vehicles seem to reappear at the base if they've been out for a long time. I'd still be interested in that legendary indistructable road map

I use APCs, those trusty pieces of hardware, as it makes it somewhat easier to oversee troop deployment. I use 24 soldiers now split into alpha and beta (Standard assault squads of 6) and charlie (Specialists and heavy duty equipment, the likes of psionics and rocket launchers, also some hand-to-hand fighters which are eagerly awaiting the development of pers shields, plasma swords, teleporters and disruptor armour but currently equipped with stunners and heavy explosives in case they won't make it out of a hand to hand engagement )
Each squad has its own apc so I always know where which squad is and where it's going just by checking what the apc is doing. This is especially useful since beta is just a replacement squad for alpha. My troops spend most of their time in sickbay in a near-death state so it helps to have a backup squad ready. Charlie, unfortunately, just has to cope. Poor sods..

I can't afford to use airborne transports yet, though. The APCs save me having to reassign troopers every time I need to intercept enemy craft. While the battle is still raging the APCs go to the alien beam sites (so I don't forget where they are ) and if UFOs need recovery I have to reequip my hawk anyway when it returns to my base (with passenger modules it can just about carry 18 people plus cargo and bio modules) and then pick up the soldiers in one of the buildings.
My fat years are over, I'm nearly broke, half the city hates me due to stray shots or a peculiar incident AFTER a dog fight when a building collapsed nearly burying my Hawk and ripping down a few billion dollars worth of highways and tubes etc. And Transtellar wants a mere 105k $ just to be 'unfriendly' again*... well, I've got the five ^^

*It didn't help that I had to do a clearance job there killing more guards than aliens....

[laiocfar]

never used APC, i will see how they do.

[Zaru]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(laiocfar @ Oct 28 2006, 02:50 AM) [snapback]263943[/snapback]</div>

never used APC, i will see how they do.
[/b]

Speaking about erm... "unconventional" vehicles, try hooverbikes. In packs, armed with plasma, they will intercept every large ufo ship. Just be sure to keep those Elirium-115 suplies sufficient to meet the needs of the voracious plasma guns. These goddamn bikes are small like bees and thus they rarely get hit by large enemy cannons. But... if one's hit, you'll have to chop yourself another bike. Just be sure not to use them against more mobile/smaller enemy vessels.

Well, okay, they're not absolute magic before you get too excited But useful to move around troops and they can pack quite a punch against lesser UFOs. I had a dimension gate hovering right on top of my base for several days (and alien waves) and then the apcs actually were magic. The first time, the aliens took me by surprise so my valkyrie was launched from the base, the rest of the force scattered in the city. The valkyrie almost was downed during launch and had to flee but the apcs actually turned the tables when they rolled out of my hangar... all in all they must have downed five or six UFOs by now and drew a lot of fire away from the base itself. Just don't forget to unassign your soldiers if you have to send the APCs into battle

[Eagle of Fire]

What's so unconventional about hoverbikes? I always purchase a bunch at the beginning of every game and they are always present in my main attack force until very late in the game when all my big ships have ship cloacking and shielding...

The hoverbikes is about the best airborne craft you can purchase in the whole game in term of cost VS efficiency.

[Zaru]

What I meant by unconventional is that in X-COM series the most ultimate vehicles were always the most advanced and biggest ones (like Avenger). Here we have something that's available at the very beginning, is very small sized and cheap, which could suggest that's weak but it's on the contrary. And some players don't even use them.

[G ESQ]

... and when I do have all 12 squaddies equipped with stun grapples, I use the same trick, I'll have some of my guys stand on stunned defenders while the rest of my raiders hunt down everyone else. This works really well when raiding the Marsec arms factory, they have the same number or only 1 or 2 more defenders than the 12 squaddies I'm sending on the raid.

One squaddie can stand on a pile of 2 or 3 stunned guys, and they'll all stay down.


Not sure anyone mentioned this either, if you raid Marsec and Megapol with only stun weapons, XCOM's relationship with either organization is not damaged. You can raid them 50 times and they still will be allied to you.