On tactical formations and movement

Well wouldn't target priority be relatively easy to implement... just make it so, that units that are in a wedge formation (as in this example) have a directional fire priority that tells the unit to primarily target hostile units that are in front of them... units on the left front of the wedge focus on targets to their right and front, units on the right front of the wedge focus on targets to left and to the front... like this:



The arcs have a minimum target priority of 70% going up to 100%... that means everything around the tanks but the arc area has 30% target priority (just an idea).



Notice that I don't have the slightest clue of how thsi is actually done...

It would be amazing to have such intelligent AI, but I'm not asking for anything like that. Group focus-fire can be done as a standing area command, and protection is just 'return fire at whatever is shooting the insides'. Not very smart, but a lot better than just 'shoot whatever I see first'. When I said that 'x has to be y', I really just mean that it needs to happen somehow; there are many different "how"s each with its own pros and cons.

edit: alright, because thelambaster's pictures are pretty, I will have to add one too for illustration and comparison purposes

The area command order is part of the formation and not of individual units. Your units push forward without breaking formation and their weapons will do a simple prioritization for enemies inside the rectangle versus enemies outside. If for some reason there are dragon's teeth in the way of your formation, well, that's your own dumb fault for ordering a wedge vs a wall

There is a thread on here that references micromanagement with a stone throw. Check it out, there's a lot of great ideas and info there.

gmorgan wrote the following in this thread: Just how micro-intensive is PA?

It is a very good idea. I wanted to add this here.

The formations at the moment are far too spaced out when are we going to have the option to bunch them up a bit?

I am personally a supporter of Movement Control but against the other stuff.

I personally like the idea:

Currently formations are pointless as they jumble the unit types up- and it's pretty micro intensive to organise them by hand. If I'm going to move units in a tight formation like this I want it to automatically place vanguards up front, tanks in the middle and long range at the back.

Having an editor to allow us to set up specific formations that we can apply to groups of units is a very good idea, although might be mod territory.

Based on what the devs have said they are going to do something to help organise formations a bit better although I think the concept outlines in the OP is quite well thought out.

i've thought about just this sort of thing... formations are gonna be hard.

just give your above example, what if you don't notice that one arty mixed in w/ a bunch of tanks? you tell your tanks to attack a laser tower. they stop out of their own range, waiting for the arty as it plinks away. meanwhile, the tanks are in range of the laser tower and get picked off one by one, just sitting there protecting the arty.

there's no way the computer can read your mind, and every situation is a bit different. think about that as you play your next game: is there really one rule that will work for everything you want to do?

either we have automatic, generic formations (armor in front, range in back) that work most of the time, or we're going to need a well developed, (and probably complex and somewhat micro-intensive) formation menu. there really isn't an inbetween I don't think.

Range of arty is 260. Range of laser is no more than 150. That's a lot of tanks.

protecting 1 arty, no less! that's one important dude.

Thanks for your post. I do support the proposal and the way you put it down is fine with me.

At least, it would be useful to be able to tighten up, or loosen up units.

With that many tanks, you could have steamrolled the Advanced Laser Defence tower, which has a radius of 120. That's 140 distance worth of tanks. Even if they are in a line, not a solid square, that's much more DPS than the sheller is providing.

no doubt you're right. You and your infernal FACTS have made it obvious that I chose a poor example.

but I think my overall point of "one formation rule will not apply to every situation" still holds. sometimes you'll want the group to hang back and protect the arty, sometimes you want your tanks to steamroll, just like you're saying here!

Hehehehehehehe I'm just messing with you man. Tongue in cheek XD


No no no you made valid point - what I'm hoping for is a way to order units to "double march" to break formation really easily. I.e. just a double click on a location to get them to sprint there at maximum speed.

Completely off-topic, but, wow. You have some scary superpowers.

My post was from September. Since then, I have barely been here (perhaps thrice?), because my PC can't handle the game (yet...!). What is the coincidence, that I come back after half a year, just a day after you quoted me?

Anyway, I suppose you have a valid point. I mean, one can say there's too much distance between a stationary turret and a mobile group of units, but what if we're talking about two mobile groups of units? I could throw up some arguments versus the points raised in your post, but I can predict your counter-arguments, and I'd agree with those. It basically comes down to 'do I want my tanks to physically shield my artillery, stay in range of the laser, attempt to destroy it, and perhaps sacrifice themselves, or do I want my tanks to stay behind so that everyone survives, but the laser goes down a lot slower'.

The solutions I can think of - perhaps some kind of 'importance bar'; a unit looks at its importance compared to nearby units and decides its behaviour based on that - would become very micro-intensive very fast (as well as impractical), which I do not want.

booga booga

welcome back! obviously I don't know what kind of computer you have, but they've done some nice optimizations in the past few weeks. might be worth giving it another go!

...and regarding the formations... bleh. i got tangled up in my own point. i'm just glad I'm not the one that has to figure it all out. I'll just play the game, thankyouverymuch!

Lol, now you've reminded me of Lego Racers.

I'll definitely check it out, although I'm very doubtful it'll work. But it'd still be interesting to see what has changed since I left.

And oh yes, I definitely agree there. I'm probably too much a perfectionist to develop a game like this. Smaller games or mobile apps or such, sure, I can do that, but there usually comes a point when I spend a lot of effort on something so minor that nobody would ever notice. And for a complex game like this... Not to mention that with games like this, you can't just decide 'mhm, y'know what, let's do it completely different', because that'd set you back weeks, if not months.