X-Com alien bodies

[lupi]

Is there any use for the dead alien bodies you collect? do you just sell them or are those the ones you use somehow later for autopsies?

 

[Dorkenstein]

Think you can research them. Been a LONG time since playing those games.

 

[BladeVenom]

It's been a very long time since I played X-com. I think you want to collect one of each for autopsy. Next you will need to collect live ones for study. Other than that I don't think they were of any other use.

 

[lupi]

how do you autopsy, can't find any mention of it in the manual and I've got a growing collection of bodies.

 

[Dorkenstein]

Has to do with the science lab, you give it over to them and it takes them time to get some benefit out of it. That does it, I'm getting Xcom back.

 

[mundane]

Originally posted by: lupi
how do you autopsy, can't find any mention of it in the manual and I've got a growing collection of bodies.

It'll be a research option, if the corpse is present at the base. You can only conduct a single autopsy per species/enemy type. AFAIK, sell the rest.

 

[lupi]

Originally posted by: mundane

Originally posted by: lupi
how do you autopsy, can't find any mention of it in the manual and I've got a growing collection of bodies.

It'll be a research option, if the corpse is present at the base. You can only conduct a single autopsy per species/enemy type. AFAIK, sell the rest.

ah ok, will need to check that out once my next set of researched items are complete.

 

[DaveSimmons]

Right, autopsy is a research choice, once per species.

You can also build a holding pen (I forget the real title) to use if you equip squaddies with stun prods for live captures. I forget why/if that's any better than the autopsies though, so it might not be worth the extra cost and difficulty.

 

[BladeVenom]

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
I forget why/if that's any better than the autopsies though, so it might not be worth the extra cost and difficulty.

You have to do the research steps in order to get to the end. My memories a bit vague on it, but I think you had to research the dead ones, in order to build holding cells for live ones. Then that leads to something else, and so on. I don't want to add too many spoilers since he hasn't played it before.

 

[SpunkyJones]

You only need one body for doing an autopsy, the rest you can sell.

 

[brownzilla786]

I have the alien containment and I stunned the crap out of a few aliens but how do they help me at all? I read something about having to capture a higher up alien and interrogate him about something...

 

[mundane]

Originally posted by: brownzilla786
I have the alien containment and I stunned the crap out of a few aliens but how do they help me at all? I read something about having to capture a higher up alien and interrogate him about something...

Shoot down some UFOs, and bring along some stun weapons. Try to capture the captain of the ship, any anyone found on the bridge.

 

[Itchrelief]

Originally posted by: brownzilla786
I have the alien containment and I stunned the crap out of a few aliens but how do they help me at all? I read something about having to capture a higher up alien and interrogate him about something...

I think if you capture some of the aliens in orange robes, you can research your own mind control technology. Might have to capture a leader of that species, though. God those mind-control guys were tough to take out...

I can't believe you actually managed to use the stun stick. Due to my hardcore suckage at being able to get close enough to aliens to use the stick on them, I had to use the stun bomb things.

Sometimes I'd pick up the stunned aliens and tote them around in my guys' backpacks. Made for quite a scare when the aliens would wake up and pop up right behind my guys... :shocked:

 

[Daverino]

You need to research both the corpse and the live version of aliens. Some of it will lead to new research choices, and others will just give you interesting plot points. If you have live aliens with ranks (i.e. Navigator, Commander, etc) then researching them will give you information about specific alien ships, missions, or culture. Eventually you will unlock the plot points necessary to complete the game.

As was pointed out, capturing the aliens closest to the bridge of large ships or near the main gizmo in enemy bases will likely give you the best chances of finding high rank aliens. It helps that the stun weapons are extremely effective and have a wide radius. So they're not useless as primary weapons.

 

[DaveSimmons]

I just started a game last night, and it seems you have a slight chance of a live capture even using normal weapons. Unfortunately I hadn't built a containment cell so I just ended up with an extra corpse.

They did a nice job with the DosBox setup for the Steam version, it plays perfectly. It's much better than when I tried to get it working with MoSlo a few years ago.

 

[flashbacck]

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
I just started a game last night, and it seems you have a slight chance of a live capture even using normal weapons. Unfortunately I hadn't built a containment cell so I just ended up with an extra corpse.

They did a nice job with the DosBox setup for the Steam version, it plays perfectly. It's much better than when I tried to get it working with MoSlo a few years ago.

You can usually figure out if an alien is unconscious vs dead by whether they scream or not when they fall. If they're unconscious though, they probably have some critical wounds, which means they might only last a few rounds before dying.

I think the game is way fun in the beginning and middle stages where your technology sucks or is just barely on par with the aliens. After that, seems too easy to blast everyone to hell.

 

[MH2007]

One of the quirks of the original XCom was that with the sectoids only their commander had psi, only certain ships had commanders, and they stopped appearing fairly quickly.

If you missed out on capturing one and researching psi, you were stuck without psi until the ethereals appeared.

By then if you had many highly developed soldiers with low psi defense you would be in a world of hurt (there was no way to filter out soldiers with low psi defense if you didn't have it researched). Your best soldiers could be your biggest liabilities as they got mind controlled and/or freaked out tossing around grenades or firing high explosives

Due to this if I were doing another play-through I would build a containment ASAP and stock my guys with stun rods and stun bombs. I would look out for an early mission that had a commander I would go all out and try to isolate him, kill all the rest of his buddies, and then capture him. It's a huge plus, even if you lose a lot of soldiers in the process.

 

[PsharkJF]

Corpses are essentially gold bars. 20K for a dead alien? Sounds good!
Same thing with Alien Alloys (provided you don't need to save them for anything you're producing, that is..)
Corpses + AA on a fully stocked superhuman battleship nets you ~2 million.

Re: Live alien research
You only need to research three aliens to get to the end of the game:
Any Live Alien -> Alien Origins (AO)
Any Live Leader + AO -> The Martian Solution (TMS)
Any Live Commander + TMS -> Cydonia or Bust

...which enables the Avenger to fly to Mars with Power/Flying Suited soldiers.

Which race and rank depends on which live-unlocked technologies you get. You really only need to research three if you're picky:

Any Navigator -> AO + Hyper Wave Decoder
Sectoid/Ethereal Leader + AO -> TMS + Psi tree
Any Commander + TMS -> Cydonia or Bust

Researched ranks and what they give:
Soldier/Terrorist: Nothing beyond knowledge of their race
Medic: Medical knowledge on another race besides their own (ie: autopsy report/live record)
Navigator: Alien Missions
Engineer: UFOs

http://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php?title=Main_Page
Xcom Wiki.

 

[ModerateRepZero]

brings back memories...I'm assuming you're talking about X-Com: Ufo Defense....

1) Very low chance of getting live aliens without the use of stun grenades/stun launchers. I remember it being damn near impossible to get a live cyberdisc.
You have to stun them and bring back a live specimen to base to research with an alien containment facility (forget if you need something in your transport to keep aliens alive as well).

2) Dead corpses are researchable at the science lab to find out more about the aliens (mostly lore iirc)

3) Only a few races have psionic ability; sectoid leaders and commanders, and also (any?) ethereal. Have to bring a live specimen back to base for research.

4) besides the fact that the alien doesn't make a "death sound", you can also click or mouse over an alien body when standing on top of it to see if there's green alien blood or it says corpse....


so to answer the OP's question...once you research the dead bodies via autopsy, you pretty much sell them and/or empty the containment cell.

 

[nanobreath]

I'm replaying through after the steam offer too. Here are a few comments:


As has been mentioned alien's corpses are to be researched. Researching dead bodies leads mainly to finding out what their weakness is. However some will provide you with technological breakthroughs to build new equipment. Also, as mentioned, researching live aliens provides valuable information.

Also as somebody said above, sell all but 1 of each alien type. This makes you tons of cash, and in addition frees up space to hold other things. Once you've researched that type you can sell all of them.

If you do a search you will find guides that list the research tree so that you can go towards what you want. Howver I would say if it's your first time that you play the game without any guides.

 

[PsharkJF]

You can't capture a live Cyberdisc or Sectopod. Even if you use a containment editor you can't get the game to recognize them as a valid research project. You have to get their "live" records through captured Medics.

edit: I might be wrong, but I think it's only TFTD that requires corpse research to get useful things. I don't think XCOM explicitly requires it.

 

[ModerateRepZero]

it's possible I think; although I seem to recall that autotopsies do tell you vulnerabilities (ie crysallis are vulnerable to fire?)

 

[PsharkJF]

Yeah, but who uses incendiary?

The only "weakness" that actually matters is Sectopod's weakness to lasers/resistance to plasma. Makes a Tank/Laser / Heavy Laser Sharpshooter / Sectopod Mind Blaster Extrordinaire a necessity, esp. on higher difficulties.

Every other weakness/resistance is relatively moot since Heavy Plasma and Blaster Bombs is more than enough to kill the baddies.

 

[flashbacck]

Incendiary is awesome! Alien hidden somewhere in a dark alley or in the jungle? Just burn it all down!

That reminds me of the a key feature that Xcom had, that a lot of remakes or "spiritual successors" didn't have, which was destructible environments. There are so many times in the early part of the game where you know an alien is somewhere in the building, but you can't risk sending anyone in. My favorite solution is to remove the building with grenades, rockets and autocannons.

 

[lupi]

Whoever said the first alien type isn't around for long is correct. I'm only about 4-5 months into my game and already dealing mostly with floaters and just got my first snakes.

I'm assuming that the stun grenades are the result of some research item? Still only have stun stucks so far.

Hoping that lack of psi ability till later in the game won't hurt, but as it is I'm losing so many troopers not sure how much bloodier it could get. I'm going in with 2 tanks and 6 troopers and normally have 2 deaths and one wounded each trip. What really sucks is I had all my guys fully decked out with laser weaspons and half in armor and still taking numerous casualties. I can tell a difference when playing with high ranking troops as they act like rambo on the field, but the bastards go down so easy everytime I get some at sarge and above it's morgue time for them.