Expanding on Nukes

Strong poker players have very similar attitudes to strong RTS players. Tight, aggressive play. Choose your moves deliberately and carefully, and be aggressive and decisive when you choose to act.

Passive players in poker are given the nickname "ATM''s" because they just feed money to players who know when to bet and when not to bet. Bet when you have good pot odds, and receive money.

Passive play in poker makes you an ATM. Passive play in an RTS makes you a turtle. If you cede total control of the game to the other player, you should not be surprised that the other player's decisions can make you lose. It is hardly the opponent that has an issue with turtles. If anything, it is that bad players tend to play team games, and it is their teammates who suffer because of their passive play.

Sorry, but I have the feeling that I need to step in now.
I think with passive in poker he ment to wait till you have good odds instead of betting every single pot. It's a reasonable playstyle. It makes players think that you'd never bluff if you only bet when you have good odds (good cards). Which in turn gives you the chance to bluff more easily once you really need it.

Poker is more complex than being passive or aggressive. And so are RTS games.
Now the one thing that is true about PA, is that sitting back and doing nothing but playing sim city with your base isn't going to win you many games. This is a macro game, Poker is not. So it's not really helpful to compare those two games with eachother. Because in a macro game, the one that wins is usually the one that has more ressources at his/her disposal. Which means that expanding aggressively is the only way to go in this game.

I could still make a poker reference here, just because it fits:
If you stop expanding at any point in the game, then it's the same as going all-in in poker. It should be your last resort.

But the real reason, why I came here is because I want nukes to be nerfed by quite a lot.
Battles should be fought out by ground units first and foremost. I think we all agree to that.
So if there is something that can negate ground units almost completely, like nukes, then there's a flaw in game design.

Midgame atm is like: You should always build nukes asap. And it's not really helping the fun.
I know, I know, it's beta. But I'm trying to give constructive feedback as to what I think should change in this game.

Very interesting conversation.... I really have to say I agree with all of those that say the entire anti-nuke realm need to be buffed up.

Last night I was playing a game and my team mate an I spent the last 45 min of just building anti nukes..... and what happen.... well we lost in the end....

Now I want to dive deeper in to the game and just point out a few thinks....... Most people seem to take the argument (and it is a good one) that you can build 40 anti nukes to stop some one who has 25 nukes to launch at you but all it takes is 1 nuke to make it and your done in that area.... On the game I played my team mate and I build 5 anti- anti nuke all loaded with at least 2 missiles.... well in that time we we're preparing to defend ourselves... my enemy decided to step onto the moon and build 38 nukes......

Even as good as anti-nukes are the're still a defense mechanism.... so it really feels like you wasting your time on building them.... Why? Well because, you could build one anti-nuke (with three missiles ready), well all your enemy has to do is build 4 nuke and your done for..... so you then build another anti-nuke to protect the other anti-nuke.... and so on!!!!!

Basically in the end the nuke will win!!!!!! I really agree with most people here that just end up going for nukes because that is what the other people are doing around them and nukes can out beat and number of units any day!!!!!!!

p.s... I really think that as of right now anti-nukes just make the game longer... I mean really when I go into someones base and I see two anti-nukes loaded full.... all I think is "well that means I need to build 7 nukes", which isn't all that hard!!!!!

Missiles with variety of damage and homing capabilities and aoe, would be a player mod if not attempted with devs.

However, it hardly is necessary outright, if left singular nukes are close now to their role. They are effective but given the wide open area of a planet they hardly clinch the win. It takes not one, not usually two, but three to seven successful nukes to win a game. Sadly, they are massive, they just are counterable and they don't cover a fourth the size of an average pa match "base" and in their aoe is usually never more than a small blob of things. They kill a handful of mex, thank god you have 30. They destroy a factory or two, thank god your units are rallying elsewhere. Whatever they kill, you can usually reestablish with a lesser drain than a nuke value on your own economy and only suffer a break of firepower.

They can't kill a commander with out deserving it, a commander could antinukr or flee it.

Totally, the nature of the anti-nukes is just like the nature of shields vs artillery.

It does not solve the problem, and makes the game focused around just building these weapons.


I fully support ideas that revolve around integrating the nukes as actual units that can be shot down by appropriate means such as Anti Air, and anti-orbital.

This way an appropriate defence against nukes is the name of the game, huge army's and sprawling empires of defences.

I think ledarsi had some very good ideas in regrades to nukes and anti-nukes. Tactical missiles would be quite helpful as a sort of advanced artillery. The idea of a combo T2 AA and gun anti-nuke would work out quite well and maybe role a little anti-artillery into it too.

Agreed.... your right if you spread out your base, 2 or 3 nuke don't hit very many building..... but your missing the entire point. 2 or 3 nuke may not look like there doing much, but they are because there hurting your economy bad.... and in the time your trying to rebuild from the 1 or 2 nukes, your enemy is just build a larger army and more nukes.... basically you won't be able to keep up with the person unless he just forgets about his commander and you find a quick way to destroy him....

Love this.... you bring out a very good point... right now it feels like in the game that once you get t2 up you have to instantly start on anti-nukes.... I really think that they should be something that comes after you get your orbital pad up and established in the t2 stuff....

The game wasn't supposed to be focused on who can build the most nukes!!!!!!!

Anti orbital maybe ... but in no way aa .. a 700 something metal t1 turret that shall be able to shoot at a expensiv 30k metal t2 missile down ? ... ..... nope
In that case better have mobile antinukes
And saying that nukes vs anukes is the same issue as artillery vs shields is just totaly wrong ... shields were able to block EVERYTHING that wasnt a nuke in supcom ... anukes are a direct counter to nukes and nukes only it is very specific and specialised on one thing ... not a multipurpose defense ...

You are right ... this game is supposed to be who can build the most of EVERYTHING (nukes included) and possition it properly

Well, I'd rather have something that couters nukes and has multiple purposes than a building that only counters nukes.
Seems like a waste of ressources to build something that counters one thing only, if you're better off just building the thing instead of the counter to it.

I liked what ledarsi said about a gun-anti nuke defense. It would have multiple purposes just by being a gun that can shoot stuff, and you didn't have to build anti-nuke missiles constantly. You should be forced to build multiple of those if you want to defend against nukes reliably.

Also as we know, a anti-air flak is certainly coming. I'd probably combine those two units and make the anti-air flak the anti-nuke gun. I just like having multiple-purpose units around. It can shoot air with flak and can switch to shooting nukes by changing ammunition automatically. Obviously it should prioritize shooting nukes.

And btw the long-range anti-nuke missiles idea is also a very nice one and I couldn't agree more.
But I'd like to see some UI changes as to how nukes are perceived by the player to make things easier.
I think that because of the great power nukes possess, they should be handled differently by the UI than normal units are. It should be very easy to see incoming nukes at a glance, maybe by letting them emit a red blinking light which draws your eye's attention towards them.
It would make it easier to select the nukes you want to shoot your long-range anti-nuke missile at.

Once again I must say...... proper Intel would have prevented such a situation. Had scouting been performed, you might have seen their intentions, and could have hit the launchers with actual units. Nuke launchers don't appear instantly especially when compared to anti. I disagree that it's a nuke only game. I win constantly with units alone and am beaten quite often by units alone. Matches only become a nuke fest if you let them

Improper scouting cost me a 6ffa last ni last night. I found someone close and just stopped scouting all together, had I kept scouting I would have seen yellow turret creep in my direction. Alas I didn't and he went on to dominate the whole match without a single assault unit. Which was the first time I ever saw a win like that, and extremely impressive IMO class4 planet this guy dominated it with fabs .

try using storage spread throughout..... that way when you lose your power cluster you have enough reserve to pop it back up.

Still if you spread and expand a hit of one nuke or even three is easily laughable..... it still all resorts to the decisions you make in a match. If you don't scout, constantly not just the first five when no one has anything built, and don't expand or put pressure on your enemy. Just wall yourself up and fart around in your little plot then you are asking to get butt smashed by any means, be it nukes planes , , etc.........

An other issue with the nuke is how quickly you can build it when you have a large economy. The lastest games uploaded by Zaphod and Marshall show it well, it's possible to build a nuke in around 30 seconds and launch it non stop.

The destructive power compared to its building time is far too high.

In TA, it was impossible to assist the creation of the nuke and it made sense because there wasn't any nanolathing animation.

I am for reducing the build time of the nuke and make it impossible to assist.
It prevents the nuke spam, forces to build more than one silo and make players think if they should launch it or wait for a better target. If they launch it now, they will need to wait 2 or 3 minutes to get the next nuke ready.

beer4blood, everything you just said is how you adjust your gameplay to nukes as they are now.
But being able to adjust your gameplay to nukes, and nukes being overpowered are two different things.

The ability to scout nukes doesn't render them inefficient. Usually nukes are built after you have enough troops and set up defences to protect them. To say that you can just destroy them on a whim if you so please is just not true most of the time.

It has nothing to do with either farting or turtling. So your argument is completely besides the point. Seriously, all you did was disturbing the process of a rational discussion. And I wouldn't be so harsh if it didn't happen so often in this forum (sorry to have picked your post specifically).

Which anuke gets launched to intercept the nuke doest matter as they intercetpt it automaticaly once the nuke is in range
On a sidenote holkins itself doesnt have any counter whatsoever
Since its weaker per shot then a missile ... not to forget that it has rather short range compared to it .... but has still the possibility to fire automaticaly at long ranges without any resistense once built it it can fire and hit stuff as it pleases but not the nuke ... it cann be stopped even after beeing launched..

However one thing i find funny is that you guys want powerful defenses yet despise turtlling ....
Personaly i find it good that the nuke has only very specialised counters
It is a weapon that enforces engagment once built it puts pressure on the enemy to act more aggresively/more active ... like sure you can built defenses against nukes but if you dont go out and attack the launchers be it with armies or sniping sooner or later then it wont be long until your defenses are broken ... nukes are what sets the match even more into gear because they most assurately mean serious business ... because lets be honest since we have access to potential unlimited resources a game between two skilled players of the same level on one planet could theoreticlly go on for ever ... and if it isnt for nukes then it definitevely is for KEW's ... you always do some sort of rush one way or the other ... be it for a specific weapon be it for armienumbers or a army composition heck even ecorush is a thing in this game ...

Strong defences, if balanced correctly don't equal turtling.
This is still a macro game, where the player with the bigger income usually wins.
I just can't follow your train of thought.

And that nukes set the game into gear is the opposite of what I see happening. The game does a full break at that point and rewards players for sitting back and shooting missiles at eachother. The counter for nukes are nukes at the moment, not units or anti-nukes.

And this wouldn't work with long-range anti-nukes, because then your anti-nukes would probably even shoot down missiles directed at your opponent. A system where they shoot down missiles that are only directed at your base is probably bone-hard to implement and not working properly 90% of the time.

What about an expensive anti-missile satellite, which would shoot down any enemy long range missiles under its range? It would work as an anti-nuke shield over your base, and as an offensive weapon it would function as a shield for creating a beach head down on the surface when invading an enemy planet. This way the defender couldn't rely solely on nukes and catapults for defense. You might even get a cool continuous laser beam effect as it zaps down incoming missiles.

Having the counter for nukes in an orbital unit would also effectively create a rock-paper-scissors situation.. whether this is good or bad, I'm not sure. At least it would be one way to bring more meaning to orbital, which I believe is supposed to be a big part of this game.

I like the idea. It goes into the right direction imo.

Well wouldn't that just create a space superiority scenario?

I really do feel like we need proper naval and land countermeasures to nukes and orbital forces.

Structure based defences can maintain the distinct diamond hard counters to them, but id like some solutions that work best when used in bulk, or when given the proper time to do so.

And really, Id like to proposition the idea that the anti-nuke defence be entirely removed and its 'functionality' be moved to the anti-orbital defence where you build up a specific star wars like ion cannon shot to blow those mother truckers out of the bloody sky, and then have a satellite snack afterwords.

And then include smaller, crappier but still possible alternative counters in the naval and tank unit trees to allow a more mobile player the option to do to on the move, and with a mobile defence strategy.

Especially an anti-orbital ship, as a moving catapult is nice, but shooting down satellites with a on board laser cannon is totally boss.