In this week's diary we will talk about the role of your strike cruiser in MENACE and the possibilities and upgrades it offers over the course of the game. Making use of these not only helps in your struggle against the MENACE, but also defines your playstyle.
The TCRN Impetus
“A marine company is a self-contained operational unit consisting of an interstellar ship (usually a light strike cruiser) with medical facilities, several infantry squads, light vehicles or mechs, and one or more dropships and aerial support craft. Due to the vast distances in space, a marine company is expected to operate autonomously in responding to any distress calls, and either resolving any conflict or holding the line until reinforcements arrive.”
The player enters the Wayback system aboard the strike cruiser “TCRN Impetus” - TCRN meaning Terran Congressional Republic Navy. It serves as a base of operations where you rest, refit, and customize your troops. The ship itself can be upgraded in various ways, where the OCI system comes into play.
The OCI System
OCI meaning “Operational Capability Improvement” are upgrades and ad hoc installations that are executed while the ship is in active service.
These OCIs come in three types: Armament, Electronics, and Hull. The Impetus has 10 available slots for installing OCIs (this number may still vary). 3 for Electronics, 3 for Armament and 4 for Hull upgrades.
While upgrades of a certain type have to be built into the corresponding slot, each upgrade can be installed multiple times and the effects will stack. We currently have around 50 OCIs planned and will be adding more during Early Access. This allows for an almost unlimited build variety and each player will end up with their very own configuration of the TCRN Impetus.
Typical OCIs are things like a med bay to heal infantry squads between missions or a sensor array to provide more detailed information on enemy units before a deployment. Stacking up these OCIs will heal squads even faster or provide even more detailed information respectively.
How to acquire OCIs
Acquiring OCIs in MENACE comes with two prerequisites. First of all an OCI has to be unlocked and made available for installation. Then the actual installation of the upgrade requires a resource called “components” (this name is not final).
Although a few very basic OCIs are permanently unlocked right from the start of the game (unguided missile strike, medical bay, sensor array, vehicle repair bay and dropship strafing run) things will get a lot more interesting once you gain trust with the local factions and get access to more specific and advanced upgrade options for the Impetus.
Increasing trust with a faction happens mainly through accomplishing operations in their favor. Each new level of trust will unlock a new OCI and make it available for installation.
Bear in mind though that losing trust with a faction might also reduce your OCI options again.
The “components” needed to install OCIs are gathered by completing operations in the Wayback. The amount of components earned depends on the length of the operation and your overall operation rating.
Individual missions do not earn components, the whole operation (a series of missions) has to be completed successfully in order to gain components for OCIs.
Offmap Abilities
OCIs can have a wide variety of effects ranging from passive boni to active skills - so called offmap abilities.
Passive effects are pretty straight forward and usually will affect the game outside of the tactical combat layer.
Offmap abilities on the other hand can be used during the tactical combat. A basic offmap ability would be a dropship strafing run, where a gunship performs a close air support mission and hits enemies with its board weapons.
Usually these abilities target an area and the time it takes from calling in a strike to the weapon hitting its target is about one turn. Getting the most out of them requires some planning and preparation - like suppressing enemy units so they can't leave the targeted area of effect.
Of course there is a whole range of abilities that can be called in, for example smoke curtains, supply drops, area scans or air dropped mines. Each offmap ability can be used once per installed OCI, so as mentioned earlier it is possible to install the same OCI in multiple slots for multiple uses.
Engage, Explore, and Stay Informed
That's it for now! We'll see you next Friday.
You can find us on Discord, BlueSky, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, and Reddit for discussions, updates, and feedback. You can also subscribe to our monthly MENACE newsletter on our website — just scroll to the bottom of the page to sign up.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2432860/MENACE/
And here are the recent prior Dev Diaries in case you've missed them:
https://steamcommunity.com/games/2432860/announcements/detail/535466136352851020
https://steamcommunity.com/games/2432860/announcements/detail/535466136352850185
https://steamcommunity.com/games/2432860/announcements/detail/512947503265480935