Orbital gameplay

well I think that when neutrino says there'll be ways to intercept the commander mid-space flight I don't think he only means the orbital nuke, I think there will also be the possibility to give chase with your fighters. No dogfighting but at least, shots exchanged when the orbits cross or come sufficiently near.

gotta agree about that, but space battles, and orbital battles are something different. As he says, space battles take place in the open space, this is something i dont expect from an oficial release,perhaps a mod at the most.
but the additions of spacecrafts transporting units from planet to planet, and spacecrafts fighting other spacecrafts is posible: just as if they were orbital units. (the egg for example)

how i would answer the questions:

- How do any space vehicles interact in orbit? Also, how do they interact with units on the ground?

Well, how the actual orbital units interact with one another? how the ground interacts with them? The same would be applied to those spacecraft, as they would be just orbital units, with the capacity to travel betwen planets (just as the egg, exactly the same). basically orbital units would fight against other orbital units. Maybe theres space for a unit capable of orbital bombardment but that would require important balancing edits.

- If you already have multiple planet, multiple moon and asteroid bases and combats going on, you’re now adding in ALL THE SPACE in between them as war zones you have to keep track of. Without a ten monitor setup, how would you keep track of that many more potential, arbitrary playfields?

not necesary to add ALL THE SPACE around as if it was a battlefield, this is planetary annihilation, this is a battle ON planets: Ground, water, sky and orbit. these ''space'' battles would only happen in the planets orbit, and would be the responsibles of droping/unloading/releasing the air/ground units these dropships/transports were transporting. The unit called ''the egg'' wich is an spacecraft that is able to transport 1 single unit between planets it's the best example. just that in this case it would be able to transport multiple units and start planet invasions.

PD:

Would be nice if some of them had a feature that allowed them to enter the planet to the sky from orbit, and the other way around. but it would be dangerous has all ground, water and air units would be able to attack it.

now that ithink about it, it would be similar to the game spore in space era. if youve played it youll know what i mean.

To sum up:
Spacecraft (for fighting another spacecrafts/orbital units, what would lead to orbital battles similar to space battles)
http://media.moddb.com/images/mods/1/12/11043/frigate4.jpg
Dropship/Assault spacecraft (Transport multiple ground units from planet to planet)
http://www.theforce.net/swtc/Pix/dvd/aotc/parade05.jpg
aircraft spacecarrier (Transport and produce aircraft units from planet to planet. might be able to produce aircrafts and produce and use nuclear missiles.)
http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2011/294/2/d/spaceship_from_jap_anime_by_mobiustwo-d4dirfk.png

http://static1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20110411000727/supcom2/images/9/9a/Star_Lifter.png
http://www.mmortsgamers.com/seyretf...mbs_Beyond_Protocol__One_Vote_flv_001_jpg.jpg
http://static3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100123232752/halo/images/5/5a/H3_E3_Orbital_Battle.jpg

Yes that would be nice, intercepting units and missiles in some way, maybe using interestellar missiles too. but who nkows.

I agree it's already too much to keep track of. That's why I even said I would like to see ground combat excluded from a deep space combat mod. I wouldn't want to replace the whole game... just most of it. For a mod, and for a specific game mode only. I'm not even advocating Uber should do it. I just want the means to make it happen via mods.

In the game we have today I think we have a strong case demanding a small variety of interplanetary transports and an escort unit to clear enemy Air and Orbital so we can land ground forces. This would also mean defenses would have to be ground focused as well and puts the combat back on tracks, wheels, and legs. I use the planetary air and orbit patrols, but I would rather see ground combat more effective.

I also think in the game today any "too easy" option for sterilizing the planet from orbit is a game killer. It's a legitimate option, and fits the setting, but it's not fun.

For orbital you got avengers and anchors ... pretty much the most basic stuff ... like having fighters and aa ... or tanks and beamturrets ...
And i dont think we realy need more .... remember surfacebattles are what counts orbital is meant to be supportive ... so primarily for intel transport and enegryproduction aswell as preperaring for and against surfaceinvasions .. stuff like the lasersat is a offensiv bonus ..
The moment you include spaceships or spaceplanes with the ability to attack planet surfaces in any way shape or form you take focus away and make other units redundant ...

I thought that would be an interesting idea in general. Being able to build all the terrain factories in orbit, with a bit of difference. The factories build a pod of 10 units, cost the metal of 30 units, high power consumption compared to regular factories, can't change orbits between planets, and it simply builds the pod and drops it down. Player takes responsibility if the pod can land on what doesn't kill the unit.

Maybe or maybe not this idea is fit for PA, but I always am thinking of a personal mod, and I think this kind of thing is interesting.

Yes thats why i said that if spaceships capable of attacking the ground were added, it would change completely the game, thus would need an important rebalancing.

The problem i see is that we need options to attack a planet from another planet. The actual options are:
- build the egg and transport 1 builder/commander to another planet (not recommendee if that planet is full of enemies)
- Launch bots using a canon (the numbers you can launch are very limited, and you can only launch these from a moon to its planet, or the other way around, cannot be used with planets that share different orbits)
- Teleporter (imposible to build if the enemy controls the planet)
Thats why:

Thats why i said that these spacecrafts could only attack other spacecrafts and orbital units, while thse are clearing the planets orbit, the dropships and carriers would deploy the units on the planer, where the real battle would happen. So yes these spacecraft units would have a support role, as they are only useful in
orbit, or transporting large numbers of units.

That sounds very interesting, so it would be some kind os space station factory that drops the units with dropods to the surface of the planet... Well the problem would be that this would not be applied to gas giants as they dont have any surface, but maybe it could be posible to load this units in the interestellar transport spacecraft, this way you could have industrial areas in the orbits, specially in gas giants, and you would be able to transport the units to other planets.

Possibly make the pod the orbital builds into a spaceship in and of itself, capable of movement and clicked to move to the ground to "make a landing".

So that makes the idea, a orbital layer factory that is capable of producing unit pods in space, that turn into 10 units and cost 30 units and the factory costs much energy. The pods can move like avengers or whatever, and are used by "clicking the land/sea/airlayer" and ordering it to s.move and move there. The second it makes it's first move down and to the location it simply stops and turns into the 10 units. Can be fighters or dox or ants or whatever. Preferably limited and t1 only.

Thoughtful.

wait a minute, my post had nothing to do with building factories in orbit, it had to do with allowing air units on gas giants...

Sorry to burst your bubble, but we will have that with the unit cannon and orbital nukes. Once we can change the orbit of asteroids instead of just smashing them, you basically can turn one of those asteroids into a space battleship. make it orbit another planet, nuke the hell out of it, and launch your units on the planet.

For me I think orbital artillery could be really cool, but also really hard to balance. It would be awesome to see a asteroid change orbit to a planet and open up with nukes and orbital artillery drop down units with the unit cannon and invade.

Because of this, I think this: https://forums.uberent.com/threads/...platforms-buildings-creating-platforms.55568/ would be really cool, because you could make your asteroid-ship look nice too! On top of that, why not add hangar bays for your orbital fighters to sit in, and make special models for all the structures. Now you've got a planet-sized spaceship! Fire the nuke broadside! Boarding parties go!



sorry, got carried away there....

No. You're wrong. There is a very very key difference.

Orbital nukes and the unit cannon are both ground based bombardment platforms and follow those rules.

Large spaceships that bombard planets from orbit are orbital layer platforms.

If we have giant space frigates then they are giant units in space with tons of health that must be taken out and wrestled with through orbital combat and the game becomes all about obtaining orbital supremacy with the most giant spaceships.

Also, the unit cannon fires units. So that's still about ground based combat. A giant spaceship blasting the surface Halo style means your units and defensive structures can't shoot back at the attackers.

PA's primary focus is traditional ground focused combat – not about space battles.

I guess this is where my brain switches because I think of space units differently (modularly). if we where to have the ability to "build" our own spaceship kinda like constructing a asteroid into a space battleship, each nuke is a orbital nuke launcher, each "drop pod" is the same as a unit cannon, each engine is the same as a Halley, etc ...

You would be able to fire back the same way you fire at a asteroid, and you would damage different parts of it. because all the parts are really just structures. The only difference would be this beast could enter the orbital layer and fire its other guns there (same as holkins and pelters), and of course those guns could be destroyed by umbrellas orbital fighters etc... the only way you could rebuild these parts is by orbital fabbers. How the "ship" would actually be destroyed I do not know, have not thought about that maybe it would have a core heathbar.

This is just how I think ships would be made PA style. No I do not think they should be in the first release maybe moded in or in a "update".

They would completely change the game.

Not saying for good or bad. Not going to speculate that far.

But it would change the focus of the entire game to something that PA wasn't really intended to be.

Exactly although I would not say completely change I would say add a significant twist, game is "completely changing" all the time. That is why I don't think they should be ever implemented in a normal mode just in a mod or an update(depending on how the game is). we should just stick with making asteroids as our "space battleships." Granted I would love to play a game with these type units, but not as PA's base design.

Honestly in my personal opinion PA is not even 50% complete. I would say it is about 35%. so we will see what happens and go from there. it is too soon to tell if spaceships of any kind modular or not are viable.

I think pa is 70 percent complete if they aimed for release features. We are talking minecraft, released functional yet bare of fancy extras. Honestly, they plan on supporting this game past release, nobody is going to blame them for releasing early on some features if it meant getting the server out sooner.

think priorities here, who wants gas giants and more mechanics (besides orbital finish), and who wants server side hosting and mods? I want server and mods if I would hafta choose.

I want orbital bombers so somebody can reskin everything with TIE ships.

https://forums.uberent.com/threads/question-about-orbital-transports.56397/

Ok, so well considering all that and that the whole core play is based on battling on planets, and not giving a special importance to only 1 of its parts (Ground, air, water and orbit), this would be, in my opinion, one of the best, if not the best option. The main reasons are in the quote above.

so basically, yes interestellar transports (cargo ships/dropships) able to transport multiple ground and air units are needed. if not you wont ever be able to invade a fortified enemy planet. (Resons stated in the quote)

Even so, that planet is going to have orbital units that will destroy your transports, and there are going to be ground antiorbital weapions such as the umbrella that are going to destroy them too. And even if you manage to land your forses somehow, they are going to be annihilated by the amount of enemy forces that planet has, or simply being nuked.

the solution? Having aother type of spaceship transports factories (spacecarriers/aircraftcarriers) that are able to produce Tier 1 units fast and transport them between planets, and to depnloy them in the planets surface somehow. Dropods, or dropship landings who knows how. Then to counter the nukes and the amount of enemy units, why not using nukes too? That carrier could produce nukes too, and launch them them in the planets surface (can be shut down by antinuke missiles too9. the to defend your ground units from nuclear missiles, it would use antinuclear missiles too (which it can also produce and use).

But then as i said before, the enemy orbitla units would be left, so well we would need spaceships designed for orbital battle, so they would only attack orbital units, not ground. the ground could attack those with antiorbital weapons though, so ground/air/water units are the msot essential ones, orbitals are more a support for ground/air/water units to get inside a enemy planet.

There wouldnt be spacehsips capable of orbitla bombardments, but there would be non-interestellar units capable of doing that. Despite that the carrier would have nukes, bu that could be easily countered with antinukes missiles, and antiorbital weapons/turrets to destroy these orbital units.

It sounds pretty balanced isn't it? This way building only orbital units couldnt be an strategy that could easily work. you would need to combine it with ground water and air.

Main points:

- 3 main rbital interestellar spacecrafts that are able to travel to other planets.:
- Interestellar Transport unit able to transport multiple T1 units inside of it, and to deploy them in any planet.
- Interestellar space Carrier able to transport and produce T1 units, and to deploy them in any planet. It is able to produce and use nuclear and antinuclear missiles.
- Interestellar space battleship that are used to battle in orbit, only used in orbit and against other orbital units.
- Ground antiorbital turrets that aim and destroy orbitla units, such as the umbrella.

Thats what i think it could be oficial. Then for a mod the features that mod could add are:

- Planet siege spacesips, so they are capable of doing orbital bombardments.
- Spaceship with teleporter.
- energy shield generators to defend from orbitla bombardments.
- New antiorbital units and defenses.
...

To sum up with concept ideas (look at my incredible Paint skills):

Interestellar transport


Its an interestellar transport that is able to transport multiple ground and air units to other planets. It's an orbital unit capable of landing in the planets surface. Would be excellent If you plan to invade an enemy planet that has been fortified.

When the ship is landed, It has doors at the sides with ramps to load and unload ground units. And a frontal door for air units to land and to take off too.

It doesnt have any weapons. So if it goes alone is very vulnerable.



Interestellar factory carrier


Its an interestellar factory carrier that is able to produce and then transport multiple ground and air units to other planets. It's an orbital unit capable of entering the planet's atmosphere, but not able to land.

When the ship is on the planet's atmosphere, It has a door at the front where air units land and take off. Ground units are deployed using drop pods, they cannot be loaded again(unless these are aircraft or single-transport-dropships are used). If the ship has single unit transport dropships, the ground units are deployed with them instead of using drop pods.

It has 1 antiorbital canon (Gauss?), and antiorbital missilepods. (only attacks the other orbital units).

In addition, it also can produce and use nukes and antinukes missiles, so it can protect the assaulting ground nuits from nukes, and even give them the advantage of having nukes too. Which would make planet invasions and the construction of teleporters to support your troops way easier.

Interestellar battleship


As interestellar transports dont have any weapons, and that carriers are very expensive, you would need other ships that are only designed for orbital battle and that are able to travel to other planets.

It's only an orbital unit, cannoth enther the atmosphere neither landing on planets.

It has 3 antiorbital canons (Gauss?), and antiorbital missilepods. (only attacks the other orbital units). (maybe another weapon too).

Space elevator ship factory


Its he building used to produce spacecrafts, such as the interestellar transport carrier and battleship.

It cna only by built by orbital builders.

This structure is both ground and orbital type, so it can be attacked by any type of unit. Ships are produced directly in the planet's orbit.

Gauss antiorbital canon


Its an antiorbital gauss cannon turret placed in the ground, basically a different way to target all kinds of orbital units, its less powerful than the umbrela, but is cheaper and uses less energy.

this would make carriers and other orbital units keep a distance since early stages of the game.

Reasons why i think all these would be great additions to the game, and not just a mod:

how i would answer the questions:

- How do any space vehicles interact in orbit? Also, how do they interact with units on the ground?

Well, how the actual orbital units interact with one another? how the ground interacts with them? The same would be applied to those spacecraft, as they would be just orbital units, with the capacity to travel betwen planets (just as the egg, exactly the same). basically orbital units would fight against other orbital units. nevertheless, maybe theres space for a unit capable of orbital bombardment but that would require important balancing edits (Although i think this last thing would be more for a mod).

- If you already have multiple planet, multiple moon and asteroid bases and combats going on, you’re now adding in ALL THE SPACE in between them as war zones you have to keep track of. Without a ten monitor setup, how would you keep track of that many more potential, arbitrary playfields?

It's not necesary to add ALL THE SPACE around as if it was a battlefield, this is planetary annihilation, this is a battle ON planets: Ground, water, sky and orbit. These ''space'' battles would only happen in the planets orbit, and would be the responsibles of droping,unloading and releasing the air or ground units these dropships or transports were transporting. The unit called ''the egg'', wich is an spacecraft that is able to transport 1 single unit between planets, it's the best example. Just that in this case it would be able to transport multiple units and start planet invasions as well as setting a perimeter for building teleporters.

considering all that and that the whole core play is based on battling on planets, and not giving a special importance to only 1 of its parts (Ground, air, water and orbit), this would be, in my opinion, one of the best, if not the best option as players could not just spam orbital units to win a game, but they would need ground units too. (As these spacecrafts cannot attack ground, but ground can attack these spacecrafts).

Teleporters need to be built , how do you pretend to build a teleporter in a fortified enemy planet? you need an strategy for doing that, is not valid to say, so as it is well defended, there is nothing more i can do about it. It's useless to send units using the unit cannon because as soon as they land , they get destroyed 1 by 1. So the only option is to destroy it with an asteroid, and hope that the asteroid does not get destroyed by the defenses of that fortified planet.

The units I exposed above are the ones that could make the difference, and make the invasion of a fortified planet, posible. This way the invader has more choics, and it's harder for the defender to choose which types defenses is he going to build.

You say that planet has a lot of nukes so your army would be decimated? well then why not having antinuke missiles too? Using the interestellar carrier is a good example. This way you could use nukes against them too.

Thats what i think it could be oficial. Then for a mod the features that mods could add are:

- Planet siege spacesips, so they are capable of doing orbital bombardments.
- Spaceship with teleporter.
- Energy shield generators to defend from orbitla bombardments.
- New antiorbital units and defenses.
...

Having actually played it some now, I can say I'm actually not too fond of space as a full fledged combat theatre as such. I think a very low tech "point and shoot" approach is much more in line with what the game needs to be.

I don't even think there should be space fabbers. Everything should be constructed on the ground and launched.
Like in the trailer, an astraus should be a one time thing that you point at a planet and it takes a big unit or a few smaller units there.

Likewise, to construct say a satellite you should point it at a place in orbit after which it stays there, immovable. If you want to kill it you need to use umbrellas or launch some kind of ground based missile. Or have a defense satellite shoot it down. Now I'm not sure how gas giants would fit here but it seems like this would be most right for the game.
There should probably also be a separate launcher structure for interplanetary travel so that travelling rockets sitting in storage don't hold up construction of satellites.

Orbital should be purely a method of travel and a supplement for ground, not a thing unto itself.

Also I'm not sure why these things have vision cones if it doesn't actually give vision.