[WOTC] Multiple Attacks Increase Chance To Graze

This mod increases the chance to Graze on subsequent attacks for any unit that has already taken an offensive action in a given turn. It serves as a configurable tuning knob to slightly reduce the reliability of the damage output for units that can attack multiple times per turn.

It covers all units (XCOM, ADVENT, and Aliens) and covers pretty much any source of multi-attacks out there, including:

• Taking multiple shots with Light’em Up or Marauder type abilities
• Additional shots after non-turn ending uses of grenades/heavy weapons from Salvo, etc.
• Additional shots from abilities that grant a unit an additional action like Teamwork or Inspire
• Additional shots after free action abilities like Lightning Hands or the Axe Throw
• Additional shots after action refunding abilities like Serial or Death From Above
• Multi-target offensive reaction abilities like Bladestorm or Guardian
  etc…

The increased chance to Graze is not guaranteed, or even particularly high – but it is enough to lower the consistency of these additional attacks such that over time, their overall damage output will be reduced and you’ll have to take a bit more care with target order and selection when using them.

An ability is added to non-excluded character templates that handles applying the effects. When a unit uses an offensive ability, an attack counter that resets at the beginning of the turn is incremented. When making an attack that uses the standard ability hit-calc method, if this attack counter is greater than 0 then a number of points are added toward Graze chance. The increased Graze chance does not continue to increase with the counter, it is a binary on/off effect that applies a flat [default: 25 pts] increased Graze chance, and it does not interfere with abilities that use the guaranteed or stat check hit-calc methods (like grenades or psionic attacks). It has no impact, either from incrementing the counter or applying the graze chance, when non-offensive actions are used.

Abilities that apply all damage through one multi-target ability (such as Faceoff or Saturation Fire), even if they may appear visually as multiple distinct shots, will only increment the attack counter after the ability is finished. It will not increase the chance to Graze between attacking each target on such multi-target abilities.

I recommend using this alongside EU Aim Roles, where higher Critical Hit chance can counter this effect to a degree by being rolled for first. I have no idea if this is how aim rolls work in vanilla; I haven’t played without EU Aim Rolls in so long, I don’t remember.

There are multiple options available to configure to your liking:

• You can set certain character templates to be excluded from having the ability applied at all. By default the list of immune character types includes Alien Rulers, the Chosen, Avatars, Sectopods, and Skirmishers.
• You can set the number of points of increased Graze chance that are added after the first offensive action in a turn. By default this is 25 pts (more-or-less 25%). This does NOT build up and stack with itself, but it DOES stack with a target’s Dodge.
• You can setup exclusion entries for offensive abilities that should not increment the attack counter or that should not have the increased Graze chance applied regardless whether the counter has been increased or not. These exclusion entries can be passive for a given ability, or they can be conditional to the unit having another ability and/or effect active.

Other mods can setup exclusions for their own or existing characters and abilities by adding an XComWOTC_MultipleAttacksMayGraze.ini config file to their project and adding their own +EXCLUDED_CHARACTER_TEMPLATES entries for character types and +EXCLUDED_INCREMENT_ABILITIES or +EXCLUDED_APPLICATION_ABILITIES entries for abilities.

Some existing exclusions are setup and provide examples, including ones with a conditional effect (e.g. Sword Slice when Reaper is active) and ones with a conditional ability (e.g. Overwatch shots when the shooter also has Covering Fire).

The list of logical exclusions is probably incomplete. While this is going to be very subjective, If you want to help you can enable the debug logging toggle in the config file and look at the launch.log files after play sessions for abilities that don’t make sense. Searching the log file for "WOTC_MultipleAttacksMayGraze – Incrementing Attack Counter for" and looking at the lines immediately above will give you the info on which abilities are triggering the increased Graze chance on subsequent attacks. Some examples of abilities that I have already identified through this manner that I felt needed an exclusion include the Officer’s Mark Target ability and Proximity Mine detonations. I’m sure there are probably others out there.

Firaxis for a mod-friendly game and Musashi for some assistance optimizing the exclusion check logic.

(See Change Notes for full history)

1.1.0:
• A config toggle has been added (default: true) to exclude any attacks against Lost or any enemy with the LostHeadshotInit ability (Some Hive units, etc.) from incrementing the attack counter.

1.0.0:

• Initial Release!.