Damage systems?

Are we going to be rolling with a "damage is damage" setup? Or have the devs considered something a bit more nuanced, such as different damage types or even just a representation of armor?

I really hope not.

If you plan out your unit stats and such well there is no reason you'd even need such a system.

Mike

Then why is it so prevalent in games?

(why do I have the feeling that that answer is because other RTS games you came from don't have it)

Because then bad Devs can tout stuff like "unparalleled depth" when really all it is is going out of your way to make things convoluted.

Mike

UHh, those systems do actually add depth. Starcraft is heavily dependent on unit and armor types to make it's counter system work; Every moba ever is built on half a dozen or more different interacting damage and defense systems to add depth. I could go on.

Need we say more.

yes

And as I said, you can do the same kind of depth without them.

If you want a unit to be tough just give it appropriate HP, don't make your players remeber that attack type Y gets and extra 10% damage against Armor types A and B, Attack Type A also only does 50% damage to armor type C.

The only time I can agree with armor types is when you have a system that combines things like Infantry and Tanks, where it's obvious infantry not specialized in Anti-Tank should do little to no damage, but that kind of thing isn't really the case with PA

Also a small number of unique one offs are acceptable, like ACU Deathnuke and Overcharge in FA, the key to these is educating the player.

Mike

Then show me. Give me an example of part of Starcraft working without any usage of conditional damage types. Or league of legends. Or dota. OR any of the other dozens of games. Whatever makes most sense and won't cause you to spend forever working on it =p

Also worth considering is that TA/SupCom/PA have the simulation aspect, which means weapons(and really the units themselves in general) are defined by so much more than what is found in SC/SCII and such.

Frankly I don't play those games for a variety of reasons, and the fact I need to memorize not only unit's stats, but also how they end up being different for each separate "match-up" is certainly a part of it.

But I mean, Lets look at FA, I mean, heck, T3 alone has about as many units as a SCII race does, yet they didn't need armor/weapon types to make it all work really well, and even with mods like BlackOps adding a goodly selection of units we haven't had to use(to my knowledge) Weapon/Armor types as a crutch for good balance.

Are you trying to say FA would have been better if everything used a SCII type Weapon/Armor type system?

EDIT: Also so much for going to bed early >.>

Mike

The kind of system being proposed here really belongs in the domain of more tactical games, such as Close Combat, Company of Heroes, Ground Control, etc. In those games, even the direction a tank is facing is important.

But for a larger scale game, it just doesn't make sense. If you focus on those small aspects of battle, you're bound to neglect the larger war. And if you focus on the war instead, then those details become unnecessary.

FA, not necessarily, there's already enough complexity. But I'm just asking if there will be enough levers to mke a large unit pool without having large swaths of units invalidated because of role overlap and differing balance (like how I understand FA works, where about half or less of the unit pool is used)

In this case focus on only 1 tech level, we all know SupCom had some issues with tier obsolescence, but that doesn't change the point really, within a tier, all units had a use, and whether or not they were used tended to be more a cause for balance rather than simply just that there wasn't enough "depth".

You should offer up some more detailed examples.

Mike

We will [probably] have depth elsewhere. In StarCraft, tanks, spaceships, people, and aliens all turn on a dime and shoot with 100% accuracy, and take zero seconds to aim.

That's not depth.

Being able to make your opponent's tanks waste time and shots by being faster than the turret tracking speed is depth. Oh, and it's realistic too. Chance based rubbish that is common in MOBAs aren't.

Depth has nothing to do (specifically) with the way units in a game work, or how realistic it is.

Being able to outspeed a units aim may add depth, but that's only because it's simply another valid option.

because it makes things easier to balance. armour types et al have nothing to do with "depth". its all about balance.

Hi everyone, I am talking about FA but know fvck all about it!

You can have a very complex counter system with solely simulation, for example, to against a unit with slow projectiles and predictive aiming, a fast unit with high turn rate and dodging automation (or without automation but good micro) could be better than a even faster unit with low turn rate, since the fomer might be able to avoid more projectiles, but to against a unit with homing missiles, the faster one might be better since it could approach the enemy quicker.
It seems SupCom don't use much simulation for balance compare to the games like OTA or Zero-K, perhaps that's because it is designed to be mostly about unit positioning.

Things that are not readily visible make the game harder to get into. If units are to have armour/resistance values, and differing damage types, those stats need to be visible to players, or you are raising the lower bar; making it harder for newbies to pick up the game.

Things like turret tracking is something that can be seen very easily by having your units move around the enemy, and watching the animation. Resistances wouldn't be so clear - you would have to read text, which in the middle of a battle is an unnecessary distraction. But, once memorised, they become less prominent, and you'd play with those figures in mind fromt he outset. On a scaled game, where micro is not the focus, this sort of system would just make it more rock-paper-scissor like.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for depth and nice complexities that provide more strategies to use - but I don't think this sort of thing would benefit the game.

I'm mostly in favor of doing it the TA way, with certain weapons being better due to physics (ie; tracking missiles vs fast targets, massive explosions vs swarms, slow, inaccurate, heavy damage vs large targets)

But you can add a few (clearly visible) exceptions for extra interesting-ness. Like a unit with mirror-plating that reflects laser beams or a unit that launches anti-missile counter measures, or scrambles incoming missiles. They're quite visible to the player but do allow for more interesting unit types that way.