Poll: Should we remove the anti-nuke launcher from the game?

I'll bet THAT title caught your attention. Serious post though, here is

The Problem: Nucks in PA right now are not fun. Not really fun to use unless you like "I win" buttons, and most certainly not fun to play against. Currently players are able to control a very small portion of the map, rush nukes and obliterate anything of importance from a planet and it's moons and prevent it from ever returning at the click of a button, all without leaving their tiny base. If they have anti-nukes you just need 1 more nuck than they have anti-nucks and they lose.

We also have a unit (the anti-nuke launcher) that serves as a hard counter (and, indeed, the only counter) for 1 other unit in the game and is useless outside of that purpose. I find a single unit hard counter structure like that to be very poor design.

My Solution: involves 3 separate changes. They are:

1. Remove Anti-nuke launchers from the game completely. Don't worry, they won't be missed.
2. Give Umbrella's the ability to shoot down nukes
3. If a nuke dies en-route to a target it explodes in a small radius, taking out any other nukes traveling too close to it when it dies.

The Result:

• Umbrellas don't use ammo you must rebuild (micro!) each time like the anti-nuke, only energy, so you no longer need to outpace an opponent's nuke production in anti-nukes in order to be safe (ish) from them
• Removes a superfluous unit from the game (anti-nuke) and betters unit interactions
• Adds utility to Umbrellas making them as important to your defenses as pelters or missile turrets and prevents them from simply being a hard counter to orbital
• Built in balance because without power or Umbrellas you are still vulnerable
• Forces players to at least leave their base to kill strategic targets if they still want to clean up with nucks
• Prevents players from spamming too many nuke launchers in 1 place because 10 nukes traveling together will get shot down as easily as 1.
• Still possible to spam nucks if you build several launchers in different places and at least do something to weaken your enemy 1st (by hitting power, umbrellas, etc).

I liked the idea of having a different unit instead of the anti-nuke launcher.

I too think that binary counters are not really interesting. We had some other threads where we talked about a gatling gun for example with the ability to shoot down nukes, missiles from catapults and maybe even air units. I imagined kind of like a big flak, that hasn't the best accuracy. Then you'd increase your chances of bringing down the target by building more gatling guns. It would be pretty epic imo.

Also there was the idea of making nukes aoe radius smaller, but at the same time to make nukes cheaper.
You have to admit, swarms of nukes would be epic, too.

So this would be my suggested solution to nukes.

I think there planed game sandbox options in the way that the Supreme commander games had, where you can disable nukes, disable anti-nuke buildings ect... Expect a full compliment of game options to give us the sandbox that we all desire so this is why I signed no, otherwise you just simply dont have any defence for nukes what so ever and that becomes the I-Win button really and everyone will be rushing towards nukes as essentially whoever can build a nuke first will most likely win the match. We want mass armies of units, not a nuke fest really.

Removing things wholesale because they "don't work" is how we got SupCom2. We need to be sure before we can claim that as a reason for something like this, especially when Anti-Nucks are far from the only contributor to the issues surrounding Nucks IMO.

Mike

I love it. A few days ago I made a similar suggestion about having the umbrella double as an anti-nuke. It plays well with the idea of not locking any units into a strict Unit-Vs-AntiUnit relationship.

edit: saw the other comments that came down while I was posting...

I think the title and poll were very misleading. The real suggestion was to change the way anti-nuke functions and make it much easier to defend against, not remove it.

You want more micro? I don't really get it. They have said from the beginning they want a macro focused game. Have you been watching the new play test the game is going macro.

I would rather reserve judgement on game balance until they are asking for it readily. They have announced they are actively working towards it isn't that enough for now? Without the full unit rooster and other missing features added into the game no one has a full picture of how the game will feel or play out.

I agree nukes and the current game build make for a stale game play experience. But OMG the play tests from the 13th (yesterday) that should be in a build today / tomorrow looking amazing. AND they fix the stale game play problem for sure. Do they fix everything? No. but its a WIP still.

I don't think you actually read my post, or at very least you didn't understand it. I'm saying use umbrellas (the orbital defense structure already in game) to defend against nukes instead. This makes nukes much easier to defend against and only good for cleaning up leftovers essentially.

absolutely not. I'm saying that rebuilding missiles in an anti-nuke launcher is micro intensive and that umbrellas require no mirco... so the opposite

Mike I don't like removing units from the game either, but if nukes stay as they are I will only play no-nuke games at launch. I'm trying to find a way to have it where playing in games with nukes is bareable because as it stands they really suck

He was ex

I think there was a misunderstanding. He's pointing out that the current system of building individual anti-nukes is Micro heavy and could be replaced with a simpler anti-nuke system.

I don't think this really falls under game balance because we're talking about the core basics of nuke vs anti-nuke. Of course we don't have omnipresent vision to the final state of the game, but that doesn't mean we can't discuss novel solutions to current problems.

That in of it self is not a big problem, the problem is that the relationship is very binary in terms of the possible outcomes due to in large part the raw strength of the Nucks themselves, if their power was tuned down, different Nucks and anti-Nucks introduced it wouldn't really be a problem.

Mike

No he said rebuild umbrella each time.

I really wish some of the people voting no would comment here as to why. Do you guys love how nukes work currently? It's depressing to think current nuke play is the kind of game-play the average PA player desires... Maybe I backed the wrong game.

No, i said umbrellas use power to shoot so you only have to build it once instead of building an anti-nuke launcher and each anti nuke missile 1 by 1...

Umbrellas don't use ammo you must rebuild (micro!) each time like the anti-nuke.

How are we suppose to read this sentence?

I read umbrellas don't use ammo (energy).
You must rebuild umbrellas each time like the anti-nuke.

If this isn't what you intended then fine.

I like this idea. I think the unbrella(or it could still be a dedicated antinuke) should shoot down an unlimited number of nukes within a certain radius. To balance this, nukes should be made quite a bit cheaper. If the anti-nuke was buffed like this (or the umbrella), and nukes were still really expensive then, nobody would use nukes.

Umbrellas don' use ammo you must rebuild, is the complete sentence.

Umbrellas don't use ammo, that you must rebuild.

ah. Well I found it a rather confusing sentence.

sorry for the confusion. I was saying Umbrellas don't use ammo you must rebuild (they use energy instead) [highlight the fact that rebuilding ammo for an anti-nuke by contrast is micro intensive in comparison] each time it fires, unlike the anti-nuke.

I like the OP's idea. Removing the micro of building ammunition for the anti-nuke and replacing it with a per-shot energy cost for the umbrella makes a lot of sense to me. The question of balancing the build cost of the umbrella and the per-shot energy cost is something that would need addressing, but that is certainly achievable.

Why on earth does everyone say "nuck"? I mean, seriously, it's baffling.

In any case; even if aerial nuke detonations were to destroy incoming nukes, there will probably be a saturation point at which timing your individual nuke launches correctly (or having them come from multiple directions!) will let you overwhelm a lone Umbrella. Mass nuking will invariably remain viable at certain stages of the game.

I think an additive process - providing more alternatives beyond the current superweapon-centric stalemates - is good, and the next patch looks like it'll be pushing that direction hard. In particular, accelerating orbital and allowing teleporter transfers of armies means that the ability to wipe out a single base is less relevant.

I came into this thread to say no... but then I read your post. I can easily imagine something similar to this in the game.