How many aliens are there? (SPOILERS)

[debott]

I've been wondering for quite some time now: how many alien councilors actually land on Earth usually?

a) Is there always just one per crash landing or more? To me, it feels like there are more per landing. And I think it takes ~10 years until Servants can spawn more on their own, doesn't it?

b) Is the Alfa-x number accurate?

I think it is quite possible to remove every alien councilor from Earth, effectively locking other factions off from further progressing their campaign, no? Might be hard to do, though.

[Premu]

At most there can be six alien agents on earth.

The Alfa-x number is accurate as far as I know, although it can be the case that some lower Alfa alien is still sitting in the base in the Kuiper belt.

It is possible to effectively softlock other factions and significantly hurt the alien effort by killing or capturing all of their agents on earth and prevent the landing of new ones by shooting down alien ships trying to crash land. It is actually very helpful as this is right now the only reliable way to prevent the Servants creating the Alien nation.

[debott]

Thanks for the response. :)

Originally posted by Premu:

At most there can be six alien agents on earth.

I take it this is hard coded into the game? No lore reason for this AFAIK.

Originally posted by Premu:

The Alfa-x number is accurate as far as I know, although it can be the case that some lower Alfa alien is still sitting in the base in the Kuiper belt.

I see, makes sense that the aliens in Kuiper also had numbers. I forgot about that. Do you happen to know if alien facilities on Earth spawn new Alfas or are they being teleported from Kuiper? (I guess it's the same thing either way, actually...)

[Premu]

Yes, I think that's just hard coded. They are just treated like a faction with the same arbitary limitation.

If there are alien facilities on earth, new alien agents directly spawn there as far as I know while those in the Kuiper belt stay there. The game doesn't have teleportation technology after all. For practical purposes it doesn't make much difference of course - to cleanse the world from aliens you need to find and destroy all alien facilities first.

[Mavrah]

Originally posted by Premu:

At most there can be six alien agents on earth.

There can only ever be 6 on Earth AND en route to Earth via alien ships classed as transports. Hard limit in game code or something.
These are the UFO's you see crashing on Eurasia and sometimes Brazil shortly after the alert they arrived in LEO. Hydra agents spawn ('Join us'/recruit location) at a spot out in the Kuyper Belt, as yours spawn either somewhere on the world or in Hell. Check ships & fleets tab often to see how many more are on their way.

Originally posted by debott:

I think it is quite possible to remove every alien councilor from Earth, effectively locking other factions off from further progressing their campaign, no? Might be hard to do, though.

Yep. Seems hard at first, but using late game tech I've cleared the world of alien agents and xenoforming (other than scripted events). They're gone and only xenoflora spawns at Alien Structures.