It's time to talk unit ideas

Rocket tank: fires slow firing rockets with a timed detonation so it can afford to miss direct hits, dealing AOE.

Whilst I'm against micro and active unit abilities, a mobile unit which naturally shields when not moving could be useful. The shield would take some seconds to deploy fully so that this unit cannot be micro-ed easily by manually stopping the unit to deploy Shields.

A front armoured tank with a limited rotation turret. The idea being that it can shoot maybe 10 degrees left or right of its direction, but it needs to turn to fire at most targets, and is particularly vulnerable from attacks to the sides/rear. A slow turn speed would discourage micro, so it's more useful against slow or immobile enemies.

Magnetic vehicle, causes a gravitational pull on incoming projectiles (bombs/shells/rockets/bullets but not energy weapons) and soaks up damage to allow weaker nearby friendlies to avoid enemy fire.

Flare launcher, shoots a flare which causes enemy rockets to chase it and forget the initial target. Does not affect static target missiles such as tactical/nukes. Alternatively this could be a simply limited to a defensive measure for some advanced aircraft.

Energy lens: focuses a laser beam on an enemy target over a period of time, causing zero damage until it has calibrated to the enemies armour, essentially meaning that it needs to maintain a lock until any damage is dealt, but ultimately high damage though. Moving targets cause calibration to take longer.

Ooh ooh!

Going off of @carn1x's "flare launcher", what if the flares from a flare launcher gave vision? That is, you would shoot a flare into the enemy's army and thus would get to see the army formation (have vision of it) as the flare flies over the enemies?

All i really miss is:

Gunship. Mostly a Tank hunter ala Brawler (from TA)

What does Uber think about unit classes: http://zero-k.info/Wiki/UnitClasses

I know you already said no to metal makers. But how about mass makers?

Some very heavy TA inspired ideas there!

However i think the idea regarding a strongpoint defense of somekind is very relevant. doesnt need to be above per se, but something you can build in the front to tank the opponents advance while your holkins/catapult/other ranged nasties deal death would be good. i'd expect this building to be very pricey and have careful thought put in to whether an angle of attack was likely enough to justify the investment.

Melee, anti-building bot?

-Dummy Commanders - as we have more planets, they would make a lot more sense

-medic bots - fast healing and reclaiming wreckage

-laser turrets - single, double, annihilator! just as in TA

-Amphibious/transforming units - like TA's Pelikan or Cybran's Salem... just love to see them transforming...
moaaar of that

-carpet bomber - thunder!

-plasma battery - with big bertha my favortie turret. Loved the two canons shoot one after another... slow but powerful. bring it back

-big berhta - of course!

-Radar jammer - for some tactical depth

It has been said very well on page 1. Add the units from TA and then go from there. (Also remove all curent t2. )

Definitely Gunships, when i started playing PA, something felt really wrong, and thats due the absence of Gunships.

Could use mobile Repair/Medic bots that project an AOE Repair/Heal, it helps lessen the micro and forms a blanket of protection in form of HPS. Yes, i am a Shield fan, since we cant get shields gimme aoe repairs.

And lastly, Megabots/Experimentals. Honestly, admit it guys, what defines TA and SupCom were the gigantic big *** units. Try go back in time and remember playing TA expac or SupCom and building and trying out your first Korgoth, Colossus, Megalith, Monekylord, that feeling, do you remember it, yes, its whats TA/SupCom stands for because no other game has that scale, that effect...
This may not be try for the competitive scene where players are only interested in glassing the enemy as fast as possible, but for the rest of the crowd(mind you this is the majority) we play to enjoy the game...

Yeah sure big robots was what TA was all about. Just unfortunately it only got added in the Core Contincency expansion and was just a big gimmick and never the focus at all.

TA stands for tons of different and interesting units. (Yes, a torpedo bomber is more interesting then a t2 bomber that just happens to be able to attack underwater.)

Extremely heavy units like 'The Can' which are very slow to maneuver, but are able to take huge amounts of punishment and deal a fair amount of damage.
And please keep the torpedo bomber

Edit:
Also: Radar jammers and mobile radar are a must.

As well as Fark-type units, how about a large bot with lots of armour, that also soaks up wreckage it passes. This could be used either to add to your stockpiles, or to add even more armour to the unit as it progresses. Might be handy for breaking into heavily-defended bases, quickly clearing wreckage before someone else reclaims it, or hiding evidence from the next army that comes trundling along. If it dies, it just sits there as high-value wreckage for someone else to reclaim.

This honestly strikes me as an excellent place to use the Basic = General Purpose / Advanced = Specialised principle. Having the T2 bomber be more versatile turns that on its head a bit. Example:

Basic:

• Bomber that deals good direct damage (let's take 100 as an arbitrary base) to units on land, water surface and sub surface (if there's sonar coverage).

Advanced:

• Torpedo bomber that can only effectively target things in the water, surface or sub surface. Possibly with onboard sonar. Direct damage of say 120-150.
• AOE bomber that deals fair damage to a large area. Damage of say 70-80.

NB exact figures don't matter, they're only there to prove a point.

The Krogoth unit does not define TA, though I agree with the sentiment that the scale of combat in TA was the defining characteristic, that and Commanders.

I saw a post somewhere on here that said something along the lines of "go play TA, then put all of those units in PA." I pretty much agree. TA was brilliant.

It would be nice to see some submerged/submersible structures. The fusion reactors you could build on the ocean floor and the submersible air factories were really neat features and made ocean maps/bases intriguing. A resurrection bot would be interesting, maybe.

EDIT: Also, gunships and transports.

I expect no less then a unit roster from total annihilation and supreme commander

As suggested by others, an auto-targetting facility, but only works on the planetary body
it's actually located on. Or maybe for larger worlds, it has a "sphere of influence". More
coverage = more facilities.

Do you mean like the targeting facility in TA? Because I'm pretty sure that, asides from the many targeting bugs in PA atm, units and structures do target radar signatures irrespective of whether they have vision or not.

A couple more unit ideas: how about an orbital nuke launcher that can move between planets. Something to say 'yes, the interplanetary assault is starting now thank you'.

I think there's definitely a lot of room for a T2 walker bot that can submerge and walk on the sea-bed, as there are for an amphibious tank and a hovercraft raider.

I would also love to see a missile sub, which slowly builds up a battery of 6-8 tactical missiles and can then surface to shoot them in a single barrage: something a lot more sneaky than the current T2 missile cruiser, good for clearing the beach ahead of an amphibious assault. Assists from submersible fabbers should perhaps speed up the rate at which the missiles build.

Flying aircraft support carrier that is launched from a shipyard.

Basically the ship from Avengers/ SDF1 from robotech.

Spacefolds from planet to planet, avoiding the space battle question entirely.

Of course you would need 40,000 energy to do this..