The Coat and Pistol (XCOM), A Shady Local Pub

Use this thread to openly discuss diplomatic motions and work out treaties. Just remember that anything in this thread is 'in the clear'.

Greetings, fellow humans, and alien brain parasites who have undoubtably infiltrated this meeting with their infected human puppets!

Okay, so with our starting science teams and the new Best of the Best rules that apply to all of us at the beginning of the game (either Sildraug snuck them in at the last moment or I haven't been paying attention), we can each get either 3 research points per turn on one project, or 2 research points per turn each on two projects. Capitalists can instead get either 4 research points per turn on one project or 3 research points per turn each on two projects.

I think we should agree to work together and share our discoveries so we don't have to all reinvent the same techs. It has been noted here that this is legal.

Yup, that's perfectly fine. In fact, there's a later tech that allows pooling research points between players so multiple people can focus on a tech or two to give everybody that contributed to that tech's total that tech.

This is somewhat old info but probably still valid. This means, of course, that we should coordinate who researches what. Currently, we have "only" six projects available for study:

Although you get more total research points if you spread your science teams across two projects, there just aren't enough research subjects for all four of us to examine two techs without overlap. So I suggest that Masterly and Mellhurst investigate two leads each (capitalists get the biggest boost from spreading out), while Spooky and I focus our efforts on the remaining two techs.

If everyone is in agreement, then all that's left is arranging which techs each of us work on. It's pretty much arbitrary since, barring betrayal, all of us will be getting the techs at the same time, so there's no need to research specifically the tech you think is most useful to you personally, although it would make nice flavor. I'll start by claiming Medikits.

Science teams produce 2d4 points per turn base, I should point out. Not 'one each'.

Best of the Best has been in there since, like, January, I think. I mentioned it as an idea early on but only gave it exact crunch in January.

Oh. Oops.

Well, my math was totally wrong then, and the benefit for spreading out isn't nearly as big as I thought it was (though it's still there). In this case it might be more reasonable to focus on just four techs and leave the other two for later. We'd need to discuss which four. Personally, I think Medikits, Improved RADAR, and Laser Weaponry are fairly important, while Improved Construction not so much. Intermediate between those, Motion Scanners and Hidden Emergency Broadcast System are hard to guess, but the latter sounds interesting.

I've checked the rules thread closely and I can't find any penalty for focusing research on a single topic.

Capitalists get +1 science point per research project, not per research team. I don't remember where, but I distinctly recall asking Sildraug and receiving confirmation that's how it works.

Though looking at the wording, I'm not sure if that applies to the Best of the Best bonus too. It just says "your scientists and engineers produce 1 more Research point and Manufacturing point respectively".

EDIT: In any case, it's still redundant for multiple players to research the same topic, until we develop that technology that supposedly allows pooling research points. (Any idea which part of the tree it could be in? Sounds sorta like HEBS, that being the most comm-like.)

The issue facing conducting technical research on this scale and speed at distance without drawing attention from the public is one of information throughput (or that's the justification for the pooled research prereq, anyway). And language barriers for some of you, technically, but I'm ignoring that one. HEBS is a logistical early-warning system, and while it's on a related branch to tech sharing research, it's not a prerequisite.

Remember, the original plan was to have a starting tier tech called Communication Networks. Since you all have that, and can transmit interception data at a speed and precision where it's relevant, what you need to do is upgrade how much information you can transmit within a relatively short window of time so foreign labs can see with a greater deal of fidelity the effects of research in your own labs.

Yes, I think that's perfectly reasonable. It's easy to drop someone a note saying "Hey, we detected a UFO in your territory at coordinates such-and-such. Good luck!". It's harder to explain advanced scientific theories.

I'm a multinational alliance. I deal with language barriers all the time anyway.

Also missed answering the second question I just spotted: Best of the Best applies its bonus to research teams, not projects.

Thanks for the answers.
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I'm up for sharing science, not communally, but at a low-profit rate. The current setup is fantastic in terms of teamwork and efficiency, but will disencourage investment individually and cripple both the comparative strength of players investing heavily in science and also making them vulnerable as their funds are all tied up in research. I suggest that we share our technologies with the global community at a low-profit cost (for example if a tech resarched cost 10 in upkeep for the teams and labs involved and there are 4 other human players then these players would pay 3 each to the inventor to bring the inventor a profit of 2), so that those who take a research path are mildly compensated for their vulnerability and also to encourage capitalist nations to take advantage of their edge in science rather than create a market distortion.
This will be better than trading techs because they'll vary in cost and our research teams will vary in luck and efficiency (and while this policy would retain the capitalist game balance edge contributed through science it would also allow communist nations to fully engage in research at the same cost as capitalist nations, at a slight profit.
Naturally the same would go for manpower nations leasing various forms of manpower to capitalist nations.
Balanced nations have low upkeep on research/engineering and a health bonus so would be able to make a smaller profit on both areas.
To avoid price conflicts however we would have to set a fixed profit rate and agree on contracts to buy all available tech and manpower from each other as needed, though naturally this would have to be renegotiated if it's too strong or too weak.
I can promise that if rate is too high or that we are indeed overpowered I will be willing to trade techs at no-profit, just the costs. At the very least all players should be compensated for their upkeep costs of the labs and research parties involved.

Tech Selections: Medikits is taken so I'll go with Laser Weaponry and Improved Radar. That covers the three most obviously important ones.

Motions Scanners can be quite important for winning fights imh experience, HEBS probably gives an overall bonus to a fight or a better chance for an intercept?

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Also, I suppose the size rating of various units and such are how much space they take up in the transport plane and/or barracks/storage depot? The rules don't mention size outside of the purchasing list.

As long as we all research science at an equal rate, simple my-tech-for-your-tech trades should be fair. You're right, though, that players would be left with no compensation for choosing to invest in additional science teams.

If we want to reward research proportionally to effort, then scientists (usually) cost 2 RU per 4 weeks for 5 (well, 2d4) reseach points per week, so each research point (and build point for engineers) is 0.1 RU. If we're going with sharing costs equally with 4 players, that works out to a player being able to get a tech for 0.025 RU per research point it took to complete. (The advantage of measuring by research points rather than RU per se is that capitalists can actually claim a profit for their research bonus, and similarly socialists can claim a profit for their cheaper researchers.)

A system of credit could be maintained for countries that don't have enough RU on hand to buy a tech immediately but will shortly have their own tech to share.

Labs cost 1 RU/month and can hold up to 10 research teams before you need another one, making them negligible compared to the cost of the teams (20 RU/month, or 15 RU/month for socialists). By the time we don't all have the same amount (one), if ever, their cost should be totally ignorable.

I don't think so, at least not by much. Capitalists get more RU and XP (both very good), but socialists pay less upkeep for both military and civilian personnel, and have two really handy healthcare bonusses besides. Communists might be a little weaker, but their one bonus that matters, the FM bonus based on a hex's damage multiplier, sounds really useful.

Actually I think socialists have the best science and engineering right now.
Capitalist scientists / communist engineers make 6* points/week and cost 2 RU/month, for an efficiency of 12 points/RU.
Socialist scientists and engineers maker 5 points/week and cost 1.5 RU/month, for an efficiency of 13.333 points/RU.
Communist scientists / capitalist engineers make 5 points/week and cost 2 RU/month, for an efficiency of 10 points/RU.

* Assuming they're working alone. When multiple teams work on the same project, they're less efficient.

Yeah, maybe I wasn't giving them as much credit as I should - they'll probably give a FM bonus, which isn't bad. I'm guess I'm just old-fashioned and like spotting stuff with eyes, and I'd rather get my FM bonusses from being able to blow stuff sky-high.

I'm guessing it'd increase ability to detect alien activity, and to react before it's too late.

The beginning RADAR installations give a +2 detection bonus in the hex your base is in, and a +1 detection bonus in the surrounding area out to a distance of 4 hexes (should be marked in the map Sildraug sent you). [The rest of this reply has been censored.]

Size is synonymous with Raw Force and determines a unit's effectiveness in combat. (Total Force = Raw Force * Force Multiplier.) For squads, it's simply the number of people on the squad.

That's very helpful!

Sildraug: I've sent orders. : ) The sentbox doesn't work at AE, so I hope you got them and that they are functional.

This has been shamelessly leaked from private communication::

That should probably be discussed in the thread.

Really, if anyone is going to hire extra teams already it should be me, I have the cheapest ones.

Umm,
you = capitalist
me = socialist
Masterly = probably capitalist
Spooky = probably communist, if he's still in
Vuanaunt = alien, he cares not for our silly human ideologies!

Sildraug brought Spooky in, it should be his responsibility to remind Spooky to show up.

Again, it doesn't do any harm for this to be public.

And yeah, I completely overlooked that detail.

Though, on closer consideration, my reply might still include slightly sensitive tactical info.

It works if you click the right checkbox before sending.

I'll PM Kristof asking if he can make it the default, since if you forget to set the checkbox it's easier to later delete a message you didn't mean to save than to later restore a message you did mean to save.

Thanks!

Yeah, you're right on the efficiency part (unless capitalist teams turn out to be more efficient at focused research), thanks for the data on that. Well, I guess I might still be able to change orders, but if you're the only socialist we might need a capitalist player doing doubletime as well.
Would you be willing to double up on two leads?

Okay, how about I take RADAR as my second lead and you do just lasers? I'm willing to buy more science teams than everyone else as long we're using the RU compensations described above.

On another note, speaking of interceptor patrols, don't forget that they can move 12 hexes in a turn (6 hexes out, 6 hexes back), but if they move more than 6 hexes (3 hexes out, 3 hexes back) they need to spend the next turn refuelling, which is probably undesirable most of the time.