The possible future of Planetary Annihilation general gameplay ...

so what i´m gonna do here is bringing in a brainstorm of ideas gathered over the months of opened threads and ideas regarding how to improve aspects of the game to be more fun and maybe even more challanging in general ... some of this may be not too much covered in detail and some topics that might improve gameplay further and have been discussed might be left out but i like to bring you the general idea of how gameplay might evolve over the next months ...

let me give you some tags first and you might get a immidiate rough understanding:

• more transportation options and functions:

- multiunittransports for both orbital and air as well as a hovercraftversion and orbital aircraft carriers
- more versions of teleports: orbital and naval
- the unitcannon
- ferryfunction and transports assisting factories

• addition of the crossplanetary advanced airinterceptor

• addition of all terrain hovercrafts and hovercraftfactory

what is the purpose? Flexibility! adding more strategic options and ways to combat over multiple planets
so lets go a bit more in detail to what these will provide to the game ...
however lets start from the bottom of that list of tags:

• addition of all terrain hovercrafts and hovercraftfactory

hovercrafts as a unittype are a mix of both vehicles and aircraft ... they share both advantages and disadvantages of both of the other unittypes and thus would rather take a further supportive role to the existing unitpool as they are:

- more mobile than most ground and naval units as they can traverse pools of water or lava and other types of pools unpathable by ground or navalunits, hovering over it
- less mobile than aircraft as deep cliffs or high mountains and large rocks will still block them
- arguebly thougher than aircraft and bots but less so than tanks and ships

as such they are most usefull on planets with heavily mixed terain and will help increasing the pace were bots and tanks aren´t able to travers such pools or ships not able to get to deep in land positioned bases and provide extra fire support ...

why a dedicated factory?
to make hovercrafts independant from both ground and naval as it is the same case with aircraft and rather serves as another bridge for ground and naval
what should be able to build it? howercrafts are rather advanced and specialised vehicles
so it shouldn´t be buildable by the commander but basic and advanced fabricators serving as a alternative choice to the advanced version of the fabricators factorytype ...

• addition of the crossplanetary advanced airinterceptor

air supperiority is not to be underestimated ... in this game it is a very usefull tool to defend against attempts of invasions from the orbital layer and as the attacking player it can be very difficult to get troops down to a planet which is covered in airunits, both antiair and antiground, as there is the danger of losing austreuses that are traveling to the airlayer being catched by interceptors and bombers immidiatly destroy any attempt of you gaining a foothold ...
since it isn´t possible to bring over aircraft on its own people Introduced the idea of an airinterceptor that can travel between planets .. implementing this unit would allow players to have a better chance on gaining a foothold on an enemy planet fighting enemy aircraft of any kind providing support to your surfaceunits ...
but how should it work with the existing unitpool not making the other interceptoroptions, which are the hummingbird and the avanger, redundant:

A possible solution would be:
- making it a advanced unit being buildable only from the advanced airfactory
- being statswise the same as a regular airinterceptor or maybe even a bit weaker on dps
- not allowing it to attack the orbital layer

• more transportation options and functions:

probably the most impactfull addition and improvement to gameplay ...
as much as important it is to rapidly produce more and more weapons and resources to overcome your enemy as much as important are the logistics of your army to get them were they need to be

let me give a short explaination how the following additions will help:

- Multiunittransports for orbital and air as well as a hovercraftversion and dedicated orbital aircraft carriers

orbital multiunittransports and carriers provide you basic travel between planets and as such are a rather strategic and mandatory option of expanding to or attacking your enemy on other planets
the air- and hovercraftversions would be rather more tactical transportoptions for planetary combat and special operations being more usefull on bigger planets through general higher speed than the orbital version



- more versions of teleports: orbital and naval

the bigger the systems the more important orbital teleports might become as they would serve as the highway to the orbital road tranports saving you a lot of transit time

naval gates would rather serve a nicheuse of providing basic but eventualy still important transportcapabilities for naval units between waterheavy planets ..
one way to do this is to add an additional model to the existing groundversion of the teleporter when hovering the blueprint over water ...


- the unitcannon

the unit that will help invading planets eventualy the easiest way, not needing to get or be build on the enemies location but just throwing your units torwards it being a usefull addition and likely the last resort for when anything else transportwise fails ...



- ferryfunction and transports assisting factories

with the eventualy existing transports as well as teleports these functions may provide the most help of coordinating your army giving you a level of automation that may help you macroing your army better and be able to concentrate on giving your armies more detailed attack options when neccesary
factories for instance do already make use of teleports
transports may well do the same either by simply taking units from factories and bring them to their alligned exitdestination or carry them from alligned ferry beacon to beacon
orbital transports may additionaly make use of orbital teleports while assisting factories but this may be rather difficult to code but would be a incredible help on macroing your army through a system
in the case of the unitcannon it may either assist a factory or a teleporter or factories have their exitdestination be alligned torwards the unitcannon same with units exiting a teleporter

and now imagine being able to make a traffic network out of all that ... ...



now excuse me i need to gather the soup that once was my brain ...
sooooo what you guys think of THAT whole thing?

And super units? With a super unit factory?

Teeheehee...

... i just hate you sooooo much right now ....

Great ideas.
Especially the orbital teleporter. Orbital NEEDS to be sped up (naval needs it more, but still) and a teleporter would make there be less annoying wait time.
+1

thx
bare in mind however those are gathered ideas from all over the forum ... so what i just did was a big example of how all that stuff could synergize together

Ah. Well then great compilation of ideas?

aye

you post with one pic.

Would defensive buildings and all units be able to fire at hovercrafts? As they are in between air and ground? Or is that a silly question?

they are on the ground like bots tanks and ships so they would be attackable by everything antiground



kinda like this real life version but not touching the ground or water

I dont get!
Game was released ,right now only 1/3 Uber dev are look in some things to fix on game, rest are going grab other projects.

Im with them they have to live and work like we all have .....

Dont count with much + than what you guys have now,you dont belive?
Ok lets see in the next 3 months what will be changed!

But its always good sugestions to the air!!

Like my sugestions what will make me play a bit! ( Global chat, wrecks ,eco balanced, mass extractores take out 90% off them,rating system, + units , Single Player offline to practice your tatics anywhere without internet, SAVE GAME , Off line, mod replays vault , mod vault ,map vault, players profile system , AVATARS, every start game you must have at least 4 mexes to start a game, fast reclaim ,fast assistence to acu or engeniers , have a pause button, Put naval work most cases naval + important then ground iff a map is well worked and balanced..So on so on...

I wont say nothing in the next 3 months ( ok you can have party now Katherine finaly give up)

09/09/2014

Where are you getting your facts from?

Cheers,

-Todd

this is not the thread for what you want to criticize so please post your critics on the appropried threads

Hovercraft:
Since they are a niche unit, I don't think giving them a extra factory is such a good idea. I would rather add "floating" units (antigrav based) to the T1 and T2 vehicle options. Maybe convert the spinner into a hover version first, so it can no longer be picked of by T2 bomber over a lake (I played GW without air factory vs hard enemy with full air tech, so I noticed this weakness).
The dedicated naval AA can still be stronger, but is limited to the seas (Naval needs dedicated AA since it is slower).

Or maybe go the Cybran route and make a ship that can walk on land instead? C&C Red Alert had some similar units.

Interplanetary air Interceptor:
Against it. I think that Invasions are defended mostly in Airspace (rather then orbital) is a bug, not a feature. Orbital superiority has no impact on obrital invasions, wich makes little sense.
And that the Anchor needs heavy anti-air weapons just to coutner orbital invasions causes issues in the ground/air layers, with the umbrella suported Anchor AA.
The farther we get from orbital invasions crossing airspace for long the better. Instead they should spend more time in the orbit layer.
(Actually that gave me an idea, see under Multiunit transporters).

Multiunit transpoters:
I agree it might be better if transporters (especially orbital ones) acted more like in Supreme Commanders, with more then 1 unit capacity. It is just too difficulty to get a decent invasion force for a beachhead on planets with heavy AA.
I would not even mind the "Nr of units depends on Tier". That would make orbital invasions with the weaker T1 units more feasible, wich in turn would defending against it via airforce (once on the ground) easier.

own idea: Mobile Orbital Teleport Terminal (short: Mott)
Basically it is carrier ship with a build-in teleporter platform, a cross between astreus and teleporter. Units that arrive via teleporter are brought down via lines/cranes, small drones or whatever.
There is no delay to get the units from home into orbital space once this is deployed, but they still have to be brought down (with limited ferry capacity of the ship). That also means the carrier has to stay in orbit (making it vulnerable to orbital superiority) while the invasion is in progress. It would have to be slower then normal teleporter (so making that beachhead is still important), but faster/less vulnerable to air the astreus.

Downsides can include: T2 Orbital tech; higher energy cost for the telporter then ground based version; Not mobile while deployed the gate function. Maybe limited to small units (bots, T1). Still is present in orbital and airspace (so two areas to intercept/disrupt), but shorter in airspace then astreus.

Variants could include:
The carrier can also be used for return trips/pick units up for return to sender.
Or that the units can only be transported between Mott's. At the source one mott (or maybe a special sender station) has to pick the units up, then teleports it to the carrier wich let's the unit down again. That would give the whole invasions a bottleneck that could be enforced on both ends of the chain (so there are no issues with more units entering the teleporter then can be brought down).

Unit Cannon:
This thing could be a one-way trip in disposeable capsules. Without squshi progenitors to keep alive transport can pull quite a few more G, so they could even ground break. I think up to 100G is doable with current tech. Every unit should be able to survive that in a special capsule.
You shoot it off. It impacts. Units come out of the capsule. Unlike the astreus it does not need to be reuseable. Or even the ability to get to orbit (that is what the cannon is for).
Advantages: Punches through orbital and airspace. Simply to fast to intercept there.
Disadvantages: Only one way trip. Maybe limited to small units (Bots, T1). Propably costs energy and has some limit to the number of shoots (I could thing that you have to "craft" the capsules on the gun, the same way you craft anti-nukes onto the launcher).
It is better at getting through the defense then most other ideas, but it still has downsides so it does not completely replace any other transprot system (slower and fewer uses then transporter. A lot fewer uses then the Mott; not suiteable to just "rush" the enemy commander with bot's that he cannot defened against).

Orbital and Naval transporter:
I don't think orbital one is a good idea. Travel times is a important part of offense/defense strategies in orbital. It might make attacking a planet/getting orbital superiority significantly harder, simply because the enemy can get all his fighters there in no time.
If this is about getting non-orbital units into the enemy orbital space for invasions and then ground, that is what my Mott idea is for. It transports the units for the invasion without having to carry them, but leaves overall travel times intact.

For the naval transporter I can agree in theory, but there are caveeats.
This unit type is slow. It has to be or it would be too dominating. But that is a big issues using it on long ranges. It would also be very usefull during orbital invasions as it is the only unit class with a T2 AA.
It must also be planned to include submaries (when they are added again). Stuff like "subs must surface to use it" could be an idea. That way the enemy can at least get optical warnings of what just came to his coast. If the subs will have tactical nukes or the like, then maybe allowign them through transporters is not a good idea.

ferryfunction and transports assisting factorries
At the very least Air transport should have the same ferry options as the Sup Com Air Transporters. It was a very good idea, just that anything lower then T3 and experimental was worthless kinda made it not usefull.
Set up pick out point/area.
Set up unload point/area.
Let them deal with the details. Maybe add extra transpoters to the route/let factory output directly go to the route.
Area commands are the natural expension of that principle.
If Asterus could do that too it would be even better (that way you could keep getting reinforcements without having to micro pickup).
Even just a "loop queued orders" could be enough, so you could just give it one set of load/move/unloads order and can leave it to the units to deal with the details.

They would be slower and more costly then teleporters, but also could get to areas where teleporter is not an option. The specific advantage is: You don't need a receiver at the other end, just an area and path without AA.
And the advantage for orbital invasiosn is obvious.

i just comment on your points in nonparticular order ...

so first everyone already has a general idea of how the unitcannon works ... so no explanation actualy needed but nevermind

the problem with aligning hovercrafts to vehicle factories is that those cant be built on water and it wouldnt make sense as most options are ground fokused ... on a pure waterplanet you would have no place to build the vehicle factory any were ...

as for orbital teleporter
yes traveltimes are important and generaly you want to transport units and get reinforcements as fast as possible which what speaks for having an orbital teleporter and it isnt mobile but stationary

i didnt mention anything of a naval transporter but a hovercrafttransport that carries bots and tanks ...
the general idea is it to be quick and tough but not as fast as an air transport ...

regarding the interplanetary air intercepter .. it is inherently a airunit that is able to travel accross planets but ultimately ment to fight against air in the airlayer

i don't realy like your mott idea it doesn't realy make much sense to be honest

That the Land factory cannot be build on sea can be changed. Then they just have to lock out the non-floatign units while it is there.
C&C Red Alert 3 had a few "land" factories that could produce a small set of units on water (all amphibical ones).

I sometiems mix up transporter (propably too much Star Trek) and teleporter when writing. I meant a naval teleporter (to teleport naval units like you can do with land already).

re: IAI
As I said, I think that invasions are defened in the airspace more then in the orbit is a big part of the issue. We should not look into solutions to make the airbattle more doable, but making it less of an air battle.

re: Mott.
It is actually a combination of your multi unti transporter and a teleporter for invasion forces/reinforcements.
Basically a multi unit transporter with nearly infinite capacity (but not infinite deployment) and very fast interplanetary transpot of the reinforcements once in the enemy gravity well.
It was said before: New units must bring something unique to teh game. They cannot just replace existing units/make them useless. That is why the T2 Interceptors were scrapped (they made T1 version and T2 Airforce worhtless).
Since it would be T2, it would not replace the Astreus. Since it has as lower bandwith it would not replace the teleporter. Since it stays in orbit, it would put (late game) orbital invasions more to where orbital superirority matters.
Since it is an adaption of the teleporter sytem it would be easier to implement and would be a lot less processing intensive then huge swarms of astreus on interplanetary ferry orders.

But it is just an idea I had while answering to your post, so it could certainly need more work (especially better names. I am terrible at naming stuff).

The issue with naval teleporter is that ships are huge and slow compared to ground units. If the teleporter shuts off when a ship is moving through the gate, it's becoming a mess.

Personally what I would like is for everything to have a hard counter, global chat, and maybe switch it to one engie archetype... I always delete all the ones that cant fly once I hit late game to help the servers as much as I can

having units be unique or not replacing other units doesnt make themselves neccesarliy good but can make them either overpowered or weak and useless ... and of course units shouldnt just replace others but there are units better suited for specific tasks ... the austreus by itself is rather a nicheunit and illsuited for big tranporttasks but rather for tactical orbital transports ... it would be ruled out by multiunittransports anyway ... as does the teleporter .. once teleports are build the austreus loses its importance on general transporting
also uber has no interest in what is bassicly a clowncart they want to create multiunitransports that show what they transport and land like the austreus does

i entirely disagree on taking the focus of the air .. air is as valid as orbital ... PA has 2 layers of opportunity for superiorty above ground and naval
and as such i find it wrong to focus only on one or the other but needing or should focus on both
however air is more direct firesupport to surface were orbital is rather logistic indirect firesupport and scout support ... it just makes sense to have at least one air unit capable of traveling to other planets on its own because otherwise players will be too dependant on sending carriers to or building factories on enemy territory and this is lategame much more difficult ...
also orbital is generaly were invasions are prepared to come from