🚀 go-pugleaf

"RandallW" <rand...@smokedspamcore.com> wrote

> In my X-Com experience even in good campaigns there are a significant
number
> of alien bases i'm not able to eliminate....so playing the alien side may
> not automatically mean the humans will eventually outnumber you massively.

I am simply curious as to how many aliens there actually are available to
the AI. At any one time I have seen perhaps 4 or 5 large UFOs
simultaneously. The alien bases / colonies are always fully manned, so the
UFO crews are obviously not drawn from bases.

Playing as XCom, OTOH, one could quite quickly amass 100 to 250 soldiers in
total. I guess 1,000+ would be feasible if you built enough accommodation
and storgae. So if one could play as the aliens I imagine you'd start with
20 to 30 guys and would peak at probably 4 to 500 - it's possible, I
believe, to have 10+ alien bases, so their complement plus UFO crews start
to add up.  But this is late in the game - if they hit you with 400 guys in
month 1 you'd lose.

In effect the "arms race" imperative applies to both sides - the aliens
start with a numerical and technical advantage and have to win before it's
decisively eroded. Once XCom gets rich from weapon and tech sales, it can
afford to protect most of Earth so effectively that the aliens' chances of
achieving secret alliances plummets. If you played as the aliens and didn't
win quick you couldn't win at all.