Paratroopers are inconsistent at best as I pointed out earlier in this thread. Going for a nuke late game is generally an all or nothing deal. We're usually dealing with an allied player who is hunkered down and well defended if he's good. I'm generally not going to have time to poke around and figure out what is real and whats not before hand unless the allied player is bad and letting my scouts go by unchallenged I'm going to have a hell of time identifying the real nuke. This is without gap generators being thrown up, if he's smart and using them too then it's just a nightmare and near impossible. With one nuke even with Gaps i know the general area and can devise a plan to strike that area, with fakes and gaps then it's not even possible.
Nukes in the later CnCs were deemed so important that the shroud around them was even removed. This is true in RA2 and RA3 making them a high reward but hard to defend structure. I'm not advocating for anything that extreme like the removal of shroud because I believe openra provides more than enough means to locate the nuke as of now without taking such an extreme measure.
My thoughts on the new play test
I understand your point, but like i said i feel a bit of hypocrisy here.
There is alot more things we could put into debate, if its our way of playing and thinking.
Like the other guy said... iron curtains.
If its properly balanced, and if only one country has it, and can be placed 1 time.
Or yet better a crate with a fake radar dome
I don't understand what the big problem is or reason for such brainstorming. . over such a small matter, personally i think the more ways to implement different strategy ideas, the better.
I understand your fear of it becoming a tedious linear game, but i doupth that will happen.
Just because you use 1 strategy to achieve your goals in tech sniping, does not mean there aren't different ones or, that it will matter if the tech sniping could be easily avoided with a simple ruse.
If its not overused, i dont think it will be such a problem.
There is alot more things we could put into debate, if its our way of playing and thinking.
Like the other guy said... iron curtains.
If its properly balanced, and if only one country has it, and can be placed 1 time.
Or yet better a crate with a fake radar dome
I don't understand what the big problem is or reason for such brainstorming. . over such a small matter, personally i think the more ways to implement different strategy ideas, the better.
I understand your fear of it becoming a tedious linear game, but i doupth that will happen.
Just because you use 1 strategy to achieve your goals in tech sniping, does not mean there aren't different ones or, that it will matter if the tech sniping could be easily avoided with a simple ruse.
If its not overused, i dont think it will be such a problem.
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PersianImmortal
- Posts: 157
- Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2012 3:04 am
I don't use just one particular strategy to tech snipe. The problem is that any strategy involving tech sniping now has an increased factor of luck playing into whether or not it's successful or not. This factor of luck has been rejected time and time again by successful RTS makers and with good reason.Cthulhuu wrote: ↑I understand your point, but like i said i feel a bit of hypocrisy here.
There is alot more things we could put into debate, if its our way of playing and thinking.
Like the other guy said... iron curtains.
If its properly balanced, and if only one country has it, and can be placed 1 time.
Or yet better a crate with a fake radar dome
I don't understand what the big problem is or reason for such brainstorming. . over such a small matter, personally i think the more ways to implement different strategy ideas, the better.
I understand your fear of it becoming a tedious linear game, but i doupth that will happen.
Just because you use 1 strategy to achieve your goals in tech sniping, does not mean there aren't different ones or, that it will matter if the tech sniping could be easily avoided with a simple ruse.
If its not overused, i dont think it will be such a problem.
I concede to PersianImmortals points here and I'm concerned about the whole split-up in general. I'm happy to see the developers be willing to delay faction splitting with a later release if it doesn't hit the mark.
Advanced GAP generators: I played lots of C&C95 online and with friends - playing against the allied GAP gen. was a pain in the ASS. OpenRA is different but having one close to a medium or heavy defended position gives the agressor a headache moving in (line up spy-plane, sacrifice units to take out gap? oops lost my YAK=about no line of sight=screw this I'm going home turtling tesla coils), in general discourages aggression.
Advanced Chronosphere also discourages aggression: Better spend your bank on turrets or tesla coils because when and if your army is moving out, the germans will eat your base. He got a team mate? 13 heavy tanks in your backyard for 10 seconds. Jebus.
Advanced GAP generators: I played lots of C&C95 online and with friends - playing against the allied GAP gen. was a pain in the ASS. OpenRA is different but having one close to a medium or heavy defended position gives the agressor a headache moving in (line up spy-plane, sacrifice units to take out gap? oops lost my YAK=about no line of sight=screw this I'm going home turtling tesla coils), in general discourages aggression.
Advanced Chronosphere also discourages aggression: Better spend your bank on turrets or tesla coils because when and if your army is moving out, the germans will eat your base. He got a team mate? 13 heavy tanks in your backyard for 10 seconds. Jebus.
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BaronOfStuff
- Posts: 438
- Joined: Sun May 22, 2011 7:25 pm
As a proof of concept, I'm definitely enjoying the additions that sub-factions can present. However, they're certainly not exactly 'fair', as such.
Allied sub-factions seem to get all pros and no cons, while the Soviets get shafted one way or another with "this in place of that" abilities, etc. In theory, the simplest way to sort out sub-factions would be to divide certain Aftermath units among them, e.g:
Russia -- Tesla Tank
Ukraine -- Demo Truck
England -- Phase Transport
France -- Mechanic
Germany -- Chronotank
[Hardly a proper balance of sorts, but you get the rough idea.]
Problem here now is that the 'vanilla' factions in turn possess no actual benefits over a sub-faction whatsoever, so it's back to the bloody drawing board in order to make them relevant again. But how so? Tweak sub-faction unit/economy stats to be less effective/efficient? Give them an extra bonus ability (e.g. Tank Drop)? Remove a certain structure of reasonable (yet not entirely vital) importance from sub-factions, such as the Chronosphere or Iron Curtain, or even the Missile Silo (absolutely probably not)? Fucked if I know!
TL;DR -- This is opening one hell of a can of worms, but in the long run I think it'll be one well worth the effort.
Allied sub-factions seem to get all pros and no cons, while the Soviets get shafted one way or another with "this in place of that" abilities, etc. In theory, the simplest way to sort out sub-factions would be to divide certain Aftermath units among them, e.g:
Russia -- Tesla Tank
Ukraine -- Demo Truck
England -- Phase Transport
France -- Mechanic
Germany -- Chronotank
[Hardly a proper balance of sorts, but you get the rough idea.]
Problem here now is that the 'vanilla' factions in turn possess no actual benefits over a sub-faction whatsoever, so it's back to the bloody drawing board in order to make them relevant again. But how so? Tweak sub-faction unit/economy stats to be less effective/efficient? Give them an extra bonus ability (e.g. Tank Drop)? Remove a certain structure of reasonable (yet not entirely vital) importance from sub-factions, such as the Chronosphere or Iron Curtain, or even the Missile Silo (absolutely probably not)? Fucked if I know!
TL;DR -- This is opening one hell of a can of worms, but in the long run I think it'll be one well worth the effort.
@BaronOfStuff
the soviet hijacker is pretty much the equivalent to the allies mechanic ....
so you want to make a mechanic a "allied faction special" ... but the hijacker is available for every soviet ?
btw. thats what we get for the next playtest so far , just merged today ... next playtest probably this weekend
the soviet hijacker is pretty much the equivalent to the allies mechanic ....
so you want to make a mechanic a "allied faction special" ... but the hijacker is available for every soviet ?
btw. thats what we get for the next playtest so far , just merged today ... next playtest probably this weekend
Last edited by JOo on Fri Apr 03, 2015 12:39 am, edited 2 times in total.
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BaronOfStuff
- Posts: 438
- Joined: Sun May 22, 2011 7:25 pm
I didn't actually put any real thought into that list, it was just a rough idea of a simple 'how to' when it comes to sub-factions, and the resulting issue it would cause for reasons to play as vanilla Allies/Soviet.
Saying that, I completely forgot that the hijacker even exists. I honestly have never used it.
Saying that, I completely forgot that the hijacker even exists. I honestly have never used it.
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PersianImmortal
- Posts: 157
- Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2012 3:04 am
nice to see some positive changes. hopefully there are many more to come.JOo wrote: ↑@BaronOfStuff
the soviet hijacker is pretty much the equivalent to the allies mechanic ....
so you want to make a mechanic a "allied faction special" ... but the hijacker is available for every soviet ?
btw. thats what we get for the next playtest so far , just merged today ... next playtest probably this weekend
If the sniper is being removed can hires infantry be merged into RA to match the other mods? The infantry at the moment look so ugly.
As for MAD tanks, you could make their shockwave act like an EMP ala tib sun. Enemy ground and naval vehicles in a large radius would be disabled for a few seconds, air units would fall out of the sky, subs would surface, phase transports would uncloak, chrono tanks would reset and powered defences would power down briefly. Superweapons in range could reset too.
That way the raw power of the quick and fragile demo truck would be equalled by a more versatile unit albeit slow with a long power up. It would act more as an area of denial unit. But remove the screen shake until it explodes.
As for MAD tanks, you could make their shockwave act like an EMP ala tib sun. Enemy ground and naval vehicles in a large radius would be disabled for a few seconds, air units would fall out of the sky, subs would surface, phase transports would uncloak, chrono tanks would reset and powered defences would power down briefly. Superweapons in range could reset too.
That way the raw power of the quick and fragile demo truck would be equalled by a more versatile unit albeit slow with a long power up. It would act more as an area of denial unit. But remove the screen shake until it explodes.
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noobmapmaker
- Posts: 1086
- Joined: Wed Dec 10, 2014 11:59 am
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BaronOfStuff
- Posts: 438
- Joined: Sun May 22, 2011 7:25 pm
This sounds really good. If the EMP effect has a wider radius than the damage radius, this unit could actually be worth using.r34ch wrote: ↑As for MAD tanks, you could make their shockwave act like an EMP ala tib sun. Enemy ground and naval vehicles in a large radius would be disabled for a few seconds, air units would fall out of the sky, subs would surface, phase transports would uncloak, chrono tanks would reset and powered defences would power down briefly. Superweapons in range could reset too.
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PersianImmortal
- Posts: 157
- Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2012 3:04 am
Cool. I'll take a look sometime today.Sleipnir wrote: ↑Playtest-20150405 is now available from the website with some of the balance changes mentioned above.
And the EMP mad tank idea is interesting if we can find a way to balance it properly. We'd actually have an incentive to build them then.
Glad to see spy plane available for all countries. My only concerns are the Allie ability to build mass fake nukes or chronosphere; and the Ukraine parabomb, which iis basically a useless ability. Ukraine seems to have the weakest abilities of all the choosable factions.
My ideas for Parabomb change:
-Be able to select the direction of the line which they will drop, right now this is random.
-Have them always hit the ground at the same time once selected(ex: 10-15 seconds once the player selects), the planes speed will be adjusted depending how far they will have to travel.
-Power buff, won't be able to destroy a building but right now they won't even kill some infantry units. Maybe the middle bomb will have the strongest hit to take out some vehicles, while the others would only weaken it?
Fake Buildings:
-limit buildings such as the nuke and chrono to one fake building each, if buildable at all. When it comes down to it, this debate is about balancing, how does this Allie ability compared to the Soviet paradrop?
My ideas for Parabomb change:
-Be able to select the direction of the line which they will drop, right now this is random.
-Have them always hit the ground at the same time once selected(ex: 10-15 seconds once the player selects), the planes speed will be adjusted depending how far they will have to travel.
-Power buff, won't be able to destroy a building but right now they won't even kill some infantry units. Maybe the middle bomb will have the strongest hit to take out some vehicles, while the others would only weaken it?
Fake Buildings:
-limit buildings such as the nuke and chrono to one fake building each, if buildable at all. When it comes down to it, this debate is about balancing, how does this Allie ability compared to the Soviet paradrop?