Area 51

List of Features

* OXCE+ only: UFOs may now detect and attack your craft and alien bases may launch interceptors
* New monthly Council missions, can consist of 6 different objectives: Defense, Assault, Destroy, Capture, Recovery or Extraction

* Terror missions can now appear also as Escape variant, where your units need to reach the exit area before a timer expires otherwise they're MIA
* Redesigned Geoscape globe, with new textures, regions, cities and country zones
* Over 100 new terrains for the nearly all the vanilla missions (except Base Defense) and the new Escape/Council missions. Includes Alien Colony, Alien Hive, Area 51, Biolab, Cold Isle, Complex, Downtown, Pyramid, Slums, Siberia and Storm Mountain terrains
* In Escape and certain Council missions, XCom will use the Mudranger APC for deployment/exit instead of the transport craft
* Variable UFO waves, alternative UFO interior designs for the vanilla UFOs & 2 additional new UFOs (Lab Ship and Overseer)
* Alien crews are enlarged to 12 possible ranks and Mixed crews have been added
* 22 new aliens and 1 new rank of alien Scientist, 8 enemy humans, 15 allied humans and 83 civilian units
* In Terror and Council missions it is possible to encounter allied soldiers and police officers who will attack the aliens, but they carry only conventional weapons
* Captures of aliens are much more important to unlock research, specially for Cydonia or Bust (Ethereal Commander), Elerium-115 (any Scientist), UFO Power Source (any Engineer) and UFO Navigation (any Navigator). Some of those ranks can only be found in UFO or alien base missions
* New weapons: Shotgun, Sniper Rifle, Grenade Launcher, Multi-Launcher, Snubnose Pistol, Combat Knife, LMG, Machine Pistol, AK-47, RPG, Alloy Shotgun, Alloy Sword, Gauss Pistol, Gauss Rifle, Heavy Gauss, Laser Sniper Rifle, Laser Minigun, Plasma Blaster, Plasma Assault Cannon, Gauss Heavy Cannon and Gauss Autocannon, as well as Alloy (upgraded AP) and more varieties of ammo/grenades/rockets
* New armors: Alloy Vest and Combat Armor
* New HWPs: Gauss Tank and Alloy versions of all HWPs
* New craft: Darkstar (airborne radar), Thunderstorm and Stormrider (interceptors) and Blackbird (transport), also 2 new craft weapons - Stormhawk Missiles and Gauss Cannon
* Research and Manufacturing redesigned/enlarged to include new features
* Varied UFO interiors

Other Mods and OpenXCom's Options
Area 51 should be fully compatible with any mods that don't involve changes to the vanilla missions and research. Since I wanted to keep it as closer to the original as possible, it doesn't include any mods involving gameplay mechanics or UI changes, so that everyone can choose which ever of those they like.

Do NOT use this mod with any of the following mods:
* Terrain Pack (already included and expanded in Area 51)
* Final Mod Pack
* Piratez
* X-Com Files
* Hardmode Expansion
* Any other megamod

Regarding OpenXCom's options and official mods, here are my suggestions:
* Don't use XComUtil's Improved Ground Tanks, since there's already a tech called 'Improved HWPs' which is the XComUtil's improvement, allowing you to upgrade any existing HWP to Alloy HWPs
* Same is recommended to XComUtil's Improved Heavy Laser, since there's a Laser Sniper Rifle with the same stats
* Limit Craft Item Capabilities can be useful, because if you're use an equipment pile during battles, in the new Escape and Council missions all those items will be lost unless they're not in the exit area when you abort the mission, and usually they'll be spawned in the open because there's no way to control where the first soldier is generated since it's random. Using the original's 80 item limit per craft trains into always carrying everything on your soldiers due to the restriction
* Instant Grenades and Explosion Height 3 (just for fun)