Hardmode Expansion

#Hardmode Expansion Mod by hellrazor
#Standalone intended

This mod requires at least: openxcom_git_master_2019_11_10_1731 or newer

README for Version 0.99.7
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# This Mod is aimed at experienced X-Com Players #
# Who like a challenge :) #
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About this mod:
This mod intends to make the gameplay more challenging and deals with
most of vanilla versions flaws, like overpowered Psi and early Plasma ownage.
It sticks strongly towards the vanilla core components and builts upon them.
It is aimed at experienced X-Com players, who know the game well and are
not afraid of a difficulty higher then Superhuman. The Aliens have more
variants and your weapons will slowly become obsolete due to them.
Research progress is a must, but comes at costs.

For playing you should choose difficulty Superhuman, since the mod is balanced
to be played on Superhuman difficulty, otherwise you wouldn't have the full experience.
The difficulty will be actually far higher then Superhuman, considering mainly the changes in economy and research.
Technologies will need alive aliens captures to unlock and will trigger additional mission.
Research takes longer and you do not have access to a alien
containment from the beginning. It is recommend to get between 200-250
scientists by November. Otherwise the game becomes very difficult.

The vanilla game always lacked proper weaponry sets including melee weapons, shotguns, sniper rifles. All of these have been added for the ballistic and laser weaponry for X-Com and the Alien plasma weapons.
A extended set of additional grenades and small launcher ammo together with added grenade aluncher gives very good indirect fire possibilities. Small launcher acts as a artillery style weapon, arking shot ;).

More armors, starting with ballistic vests up to reinforced power and flying suits expand the survival capabilities of your soldiers. Power armor also extends stamina and increases carry capacity.

Have fun exploring the new drones and tanks, which will draw alien fire and help detecting targets to shot or support your wounded troops. Drones may even help with capturing alive aliens.

A large number of terrains from Hobbes terrain pack and other mods (65+ additonal terrains) have been integrated and partially overworked (bugfixes mostly).
A extended set of maps has been added, featering turned version and additonal maps modules to make fighting within alien bases more enjoyable and tactical challenging.
Aliens have a couple of more UFO types, Fighter, Sentry, Excavator and LabShip.
Vanilla UFOs and new UFOs types all have extended set of interior maps variants (total 124 map). So enjoy exploring these.

Aircombat has been balanced, UFO's especially big ones will shot your interceptors.
A faster and much more durable interception craft has been added, also a enhanced skyranger version, with a back door.
Swarming Terrorships with interception craft is highly recommended.
The Laser cannon is actually useable now ;)

Being able to interrogate alive aliens requires you to raid a nearby Alien Base early.
Otherwise you have no tech progress. The base is located in your starting
region. For the time being also one of the Story Items is located in
the alien base. Raid this base as early as possible!
The game can only be won by capturing and interrogating a Ethereal Commander who unlocks the final mission.

However your run goes, let me know your feedback and how i can enhance the mod further.
For a detailed list of changes (may contain spoilers) see the Features further down.

For a real challenge play the game in Iron Man Mode!
Please do no use the OpenXcom Iron Man option and enforce your own Iron Man Mode, its a big mod, so bugs may happen.

I hope you will enjoy this collection of 60+ Mods (i stopped counting)
and please report any possible Bug you might find on the forum.
Feedback of any form is also appreciated.

Compability to other mods:
This mod is intended to be a Standalone Mod.
Mods which only add new Items and New Crafts may not pose a problem.
UFO Extender Accuracy (Full support)
High Quality Sounds (http://www.openxcom.com/mod/high-quality-sounds) from Daedalus

Not compatible:
Commendations Mod (already integrated)
PSX Static Cydonia Map
XcomUtil Improved Base Layout
XcomUtil Defensive Base Layout
XcomUtil Improved Tanks
XcomUtil Improved Heavy Laser
All Mods which bring their own:
alienDeployments
itemLevels
alienMissions

The list of included Mods is pretty big (60+) see Features.
Mostly Graphics, New Units, Terrains and Weapons.

Recommended Advanced Options:
Save Preprimed Grenades (for Smoke Grenades)
Alternate Movement Methods (to fight faster)
Explosion Height 3 (to destroy buildings in 1 go with HE Packs / Large Rockets etc..)
Storage limits for recovered Items (sell directly after a mission)
Live Alien Sale (to clean out what you do not need)
Forced Craft launch (probably needed since your craft will get shot a lot)
Alien Bleeding

Creditlist:
see CREDIT.TXT

Features:

Additional Alien Races/Units:
Waspite
Gazer
Sectoid Elite
Muton Elite
Muton Elite Guard
Muton Berserker Terrorist
Armored Cyberdisc Terrorist
Armored Sectopod Terrorist
Chryssalid Spitter Terrorist

Additional Alien Missions:
Ship Attack
Docked Ship

General Gameplay changes:
Your Soldiers will be awarded with Medals (currently there are 61 Medals).
Globe with 330 Cities (including vanilla ones)
Research costs are 1,5 times vanilla
Alive Aliens are needed to unlock techs (-> Research Tree Graphic)
8 Armored Vests, which you need to equip on your Soldiers
Melee Weapons apply Skill and Strength
X-Com Soldiers start with Melee Accuracy from range 40-60
More saner starting weapons stock and equipment for the Skyranger
Defensive starting Base layout (with 1 Additional General Stores)
Psi Amp is harder to get throu research
Psi Amp production is much more expensive
Corpses give access to World News and are needed for Meditkits
Alien Alloys can not be produced, they are as precious as Elerium-115 now
Elerium-115 recovery per UFO Power Source is 50% vanilla (25)
Alien Alloys recovered from UFO mission are ~36% lower then vanilla
Terrormissions have multiple Alerts and Terrainhint
Aliens do have more chances to score more points.
Alien Bases will also invoke Alien Missions in their regions (10% chance)
Interrogating alive Navigators and Engineers will trigger additional monthly Aliens Missions (limited to 2 Missions per Month)
Winning, losing or aborting a Mission will play a small cutscene from the Original PSX version of the game
Flying towards, loosing or winning Cydonia will play Original PSX Version cutscenes

Economic:
The maximum funding you can receive from Nations is cut by 50%
All Alien Items and Alive Aliens give less money when sold (50%)
Base Maintence Cost increased to 10% of base modules price
X-Com Wages and Hire Cost are 1.5 times Vanilla
X-Com Armors and Crafts are a lot more expensive to produce
Drones, Tanks and Soldier Armor is repairable, if the corpses are recovered intact
Drones, Tanks and Soldier Armor is upgradeable

Groundcombat changes:
Chronological Racemixes
Aliens are earlier aware of your presence
Bigger Map for Terrormissions (60x60 and up to 24 Civilians)
Bigger Maps also for Battleship, Terrorships and Labship (all 60x60)
Alien will use Explosives and Explosive Weaponry from Turn 1 in Ground Combats
Increased PSI Defenses for Aliens, but same Attack values (Soldier with PSI Str 80+ are fine as in vanilla)
Ethereals are immune to MC from Xcom
Aliens receive a Bravery Bonus (+10, Commanders are removed from Battleship and Base Defense Missions, increased numbers panic to quickly)
Aliens have more saner Melee accuracy stats
Kneeling Indicator and Improved TU Reserve Sprites
Better Smoke Animation
New Plasma Hit Animation for Heavy Plasma
Colored Explosions (Grey: Smoke, Yellow: HE, Stun: Purple)
Chryssalids are slightly vulnarable to HE damage (as stated in the UFOpedia)
Sectopod does Laser Damage (as stated in UFOpedia)
Blaster Waypoints honor DOS Limitation (9 Waypoints)
Shotgun Class Weaponry for Xcom and Aliens
Dedicaded Melee Weaponry for Xcom and Aliens

To actually enable X-Com forces to be successful in their Mission to save Earth a good combination of additional weaponry and equipment has been added, for X-Com and Aliens see detailed list:

Storyitems:
Alien Data Slate (currently carried by Alien Base Commanders)
Alien Data Core (currently located in Battleships)

Additional Alien Weapons:
Plasma Blade
Plasma Sword
Plasma Shotgun
Plasma Sniper Rifle
Small Launcher with Arcing Shot.
Elerium Bomb for Small Launcher
Smoke Bomb for Small Launcher
Fire Bomb for Small Launcher
Aliens will keep most weaponry through the game
Aliens have all weapons avaible from start

Additional Alien UFOs:
Fighter (9 Maps)
Sentry (14 Maps)
Excavator (11)
Labship (4 Maps)

Additional Interior UFO Variant Maps:
Medium Scout (8 Maps)
Large Scout (27 Maps)
Harvester (24 Maps)
Abductor (10 Maps)
Terror Ship (8 Maps)
Supply Ship (2 Maps)
Battleship (7 Maps)

Additional X-Com Weapons:
Combat Knife
Alloy Knife
Alloy Blade
Taser Pistol
Shotgun
Sniper Rifle
Grenade Launcher
Elerium Rocket
Scatter Laser
Heavy Laser Replacements:
Heavy Laser/Sniper
Heavy Laser/Auto
Flashbang Grenade
Incendiary Grenade
Stun Grenade
Fire Grenade

All kinetic weapons also get Alloy Ammo once researched.
Alloy Ammo adds +10 Damage on top of convential AP Ammo.

Also 3 Medikits, one available from start, the others are researchable.
Research is Corpsebased and also requires Storyitems.

Additional X-Com Tanks:
Drone/Scout
Drone/Scanner
Drone/Medikit
Drone/Taser
Alloy Drone/Scout
Alloy Drone/Scanner
Alloy Drone/Medikit
Alloy Drone/Taser
Alloy Tank Cannon
Alloy Tank Rocket Launcher
Alloy Tank Laser
Hovertank Laser
Hovertank Elerium Bomb
Walkertank Plasma

Hovertank Launcher Ammo does 200 damage instead of 140

Drones can be upgraded, repaired and refitted.
Tanks can be repaired and upgraded.

Additional X-Com Armor:
Armored Vest
Alloy Vest
Reinforced Power Suit
Reinforced Flying Suit

Soldier Armor can be repaired and upgraded.

Additional X-Com Craft:
Retaliator (Advanced Interceptor)
Skystriker (Improved Skyranger)
Thunder (Lightning replacement)

Additional X-Com Craft Weapons:
Alloy Cannon
Modified Range for Vanilla Weapons

Additional Terrains:
Airfield
Area 51
Cargo Ship
City Snow
Commercial
Expanded Farm A
Expanded Farm B
Expanded UBASE Maps
Desert Mountain
Desert Temple
Desert Plane
Dawn City A
Dawn City B
Expanded Terror
Expanded Terror Snow
Expanded Urban Mix
Expanded Urban Mix Snow
Forest Mountain
Forest Marsh
Grassland Desert
Grassland Desert Mountain
Grassland Forest
Grassland Forest Mountain
Grassland Swamp
Industrial
Industrial UFO
Island
Jungle Mountain
Jungle Swamp
Jungle Temple
Liner Ship
Expanded Urban
Expanded Urban UFO
Expanded Urban Snow
Native (Farm + Jungle)
Native UFO
Polar Desert
Polar Desert Mountain
Polar Mountain
Polar Plane
Docked Cargo Ship
Port Industrial
Docked Liner Ship
Port TFTD
Port Modified
Railyard
Savanna Desert
Savanna Desert Mountain
Savanna Forest
Savanna Forest Mountain
Savanna Swamp
Steppe Desert
Steppe Desert Mountain
Steppe Forest
Steppe Forest Mountain
Steppe Swamp
Taiga Desert
Taiga Desert Mountain
Taiga Forest
Taiga Forest Mountain
Taiga Swamp
Tundra Desert
Tundra Desert Mountain
Tundra Forest
Tundra Forest Mountain
Tundra Mountain
Tundra Plane
Tundra Swamp

Currently Supported Languages:
English US (en-US)
English UK (en-GB)
Japanese JA (ja)
Russian RU (ru)

Partially Supported Languages (50%+):
Italien IT (it)
Polish PL (pl)
German DE (de)
Hungarien HU (hu)
Czech CS (cs)

Future planned additions:
More translations
Some 20x20 Maps Modules for Mars Terrain
Intermediate Third Stage for Final Mission
Armed Humans for Terrormissions and Other Missions
Alien Commandship
Special Mission to aquire the Alien Data Slate (not done)
Special Mission to aquire the Alien Data Core (not done)
Special Mission to aquire the Psi Amp (not done)

#Hardmode Expansion Mod by hellrazor

Intall instructions:
- Go to your Mod folder and delete the old "Hardmode_Expansion" directory.
- Extract Zip file
- Copy over the directory "Hardmode_Expansion" in your user mods directory.
- Active "Hardmode_Expansion" under Mods

This mod requieres at least: openxcom_git_master_2019_11_10_1731 or newer

#Hardmode Expansion Mod by hellrazor
#Credits for Version 0.99.7
Credits go to:
Everyone in #openxcom @freenode
Everyone in the OXC community, which somehow provided feedback, bugreports etc..

hellrazor:
- developing the modpack
- testplaying and debugging
- adding details
- balancing
SupSuper:
- For OpenXcom (Dude you made my dreams about X-Com come to reality!!!)
- For the patience to listen to my questions
- For fulfilling many feature requests
- For being receptive to sloppely Bug Reports
Warboy1982:
- For his contributions to the OpenXcom project
- For his patience dealing with a lot of my question
- For the Reproduction Mod
- For the Shotgun Mod
- For the AlloyVest Sprite
- For the Sectopod HWP
- For the Combat Knife
Hobbes:
- For inspiring me with his modding work and his fanfiction UFO Book!
- For answering many of my questions
- For his awesome Terrainpack Mod
- For many of the World News Strings
SolariusScorch:
- For the AlloyVest
- For the Plasma Sniper Rifle
- For several UfoPaedia Techpics
- For the SolarsNewUFO's Mod (Which i took the freedom to bugfix and made loads of new map variants for)
- For AI routing for the Railyard UFO2000 terrain conversion, additional maps and tile images for Commercial UFO2000 terrain conversion.
- For contributing to the YetMoreUFOs Mod from which is took a lot of the initial UFO Maps
Dioxine:
- Fir disagreeing with me (Honestly!)
- For the Alloy Knife sprites
- For a lot of Sprites for Civilians
- For the Commendations Mod
Falko:
- For his OpenXcom Modding tools ( http://falkooxc2.pythonanywhere.com/ )
The Sprite converter is so essential to my work!!
Fatrat:
- For the Elerium Bomb, which gave birth to some more bombs ;)
- For the Incendiary Grenade
Ivan Dogovich:
- For the Vanilla HandObSprites
- For the Combat Knife HitSound
- For the Install Video for OpenXcom and Mods
- For the additional Drone Sprites
- For the Commendations Mod
CryptoCactus:
- For the Alloy Ground Tanks
- For the Blue Smoke Grenade Sprites
Shadow:
- For the Improved Interceptor (Retaliator)
- For the PowerSuit/FlyingSuit Inventory sprites
Arthanor:
- For the Alloy Tanks Corpsesprite
- For the Alternate Explosionsprites
Roxies321:
- For the Heavy Laser Auto Sprites
Ryskeliini:
- For the Taser Pistol
- For the Grenade Launcher
- For the Grey Armored Vest
- For the original Drones Sprite
Robin:
- For the Grey Armored Vest
- For the Gazer Aliens
- For the Waspite Aliens
- For the alternate Smokesprite
trollworkout:
- For the Matching Laser Weapon Sprites
- For the Matching Plasma Weapon Sprites
- For the Matching Standard Weapons
- For the New Blaster Launcher Sprites
- For the Muton Elite Guard Sprites
xOps:
- For the Muton Elite Guard Inventory Picture
- For the Muton Elite Ufopaedia Pictures
- For the Sectoid Elite Sprites
- For the Tileset graphics for the Atlantis Desert and Mu Jungle terrains
- For the Muton Berserker Sprites and 1 Sound
luke83:
- For a lot of UFO Maps variants (Which I had the pleasure to rework and bugcheck and slightly expand)
- For the initial design of the Expanded Ubase Maps (I had great pleasure expanding those ;))
- For the initial design of the Expanded Terror Maps (Bugfixing those was a pain!)
- For the Vanilla Alien Inventory Sprites
- For the Sectopod HWP
pWWWa:
- For the new Plasma Hit Animation
- For the Plasma Melee Weapons
- For the Custom HitAnimations for the Combat Knife, Alloy Knife and Alloy Sword
chaosshade:
- For the PlasmaShotgun (Deadliest weapon ever after Blaster Launchers =))
- For the Elerium Rocket
- For the recolored Medikit Sprites
- For the Blue Smoke Grenade and StunGrenade HandOb
- For the Recolor of HeavyLaserAuto sprites
clownagent:
- For the Jumpsuit Ufopaedia ruleset
- For the initial Fastramp ruleset
- For the UFOPaedia entry for Jumpsuits
civilian:
- For the Alloy Knife
- For the Alloy Sword Sprites
- For the Improved TU reserve Sprite
- For the Kneeling Indicator
Moriaty:
- For the Alloy Ammo
- For the enhanced Power and Flying Suit Sprites
Bloax:
- For the Muton Berserker Sounds
- For the Skystriker UfoPaedia Picture
Cooper:
- For his nicely done Battleship Variants
bloodman123726:
- For the AlloyVest
yrizoud:
- For the Field Medi Pack Sprites
Phaedris:
- For the Muton Elite Sprites
LouisdeFuines:
- For the Laser Sectopod Ruleset
aldorn:
- For the Flashbang Grenade Sprites
Cirix:
- For the Vanilla Alien Inventory Sprites
MicktheMage:
- For the Alloy Cannon UfoPaedia picture
Shoes:
- For the Commendations Mod
shadics:
- For the Better Personal Armor Sprites
Falco:
- For the Sectopod HWP
oshiaki2115:
- For the SniperRifle
Murmur:
- For the StunGrenade
54x:
- For the enhanced Vanilla Flying Suits Spriteset.
Jukebox:
- For helping me balancing PSI values
nadir:
- For helping formulate many of the new NEWS strings, Muton Berserker Texts
Nachtwolf & Voller:
- For the Dawn City tilesets images (originally developed for UFO2000)
Bagirov:
- For the Industrial terrain design (originally developed for UFO2000)
Twilight Owl:
- For the original Airfield UFO2000 terrain
sylandro:
- For the PSXCutscenes Mod
All translaters on the TRANSIFEX project (you guys are awesome)

This list is for sure not complete.
If i forgot someone, or something is incorrect, please let me know.