Bridges

Freezing it is an interesting solution, I feel like that could be really fun. But you'd still need a way to cross chasms or other things like that which don't have a freezable surface.

I'm imagining an army moving across a frozen lake and the other team flaming the ice to melt it and sink all of the tanks

That could be seriously cool. Only issue I see with this is availability of flame/ice creation. It could be annoying to have to build flame tanks simply to melt ice. You would want the ability to freeze and melt be something you wouldn't have to go crazy out of the way to get.

Explosions break up ice pretty well too, arty or even direct fire weapons should work fine

Recreate able bridges and destructible ones would be fun to fight over and see my foes tanks drown and short circuit in the water.

In ice maps of Tiberium Sun. There were lakes or parts of water that where frozen over. You could let your units go over the ice and with force fire you could aim for the ice to blow it up. Then enemies couldnt reach you or they would fall in the water. The ice would regenerate over time.

For getting to high ground I think it would be fun if you could blow up a weaker part of a cliff.

But bridges are nice to, for rivers and lava streams. You could have a bridge unit or give the engineers the option to build a bridge.
The bridge unit would be instantly deployed. It already costed time to produce. To make a bridge with an engineer it would take some time. It would be nice if you could upgrade the bridge to medium and large size. Also a self destruct option would be nice if an enemy would try to use the bridge.

I believe I may have found a suitable compromise.

Ice generators. Buildings you can build on-water that would chill the area and allow units to cross it.

As for waterless chasms, terraforming would be ideal. You place it on one end of the chasm, tell it what direction to go in and it "grows" a bridge to the other end. With lava. So it'll be cool.

Even with freezing, there is still the problem of building a bridge over a chasm. I'd rather have engineers build bridges over water and chasms (this is where airborne engies come in handy) and maybe a little nit that can transform into a small bridge.

Could have engineers build halo style man cannons to launch units over a short distance. :lol:


But then again, isn't the idea of a chasm that you can't just go over it?

The terraforming tool in ZK (specifically the ramp one) has a UI that would make for very nice bridges.

Click start, click end (with green/yellow/red to show pathability of the slope), drag up/down to adjust width, click again to confirm.

ZK will of course just make a solid ramp but you could borrow the UI design for custom bridges.

I found zero-k's terraforming to be jarring to use and to be really silly due to how it kinda invalidates the point of natural terrain.

Lol, Yes! I approve! Mini unit cannons! You could even call them the 'Aragorn' or the 'Ranger' for a less blatant reference

Hehe, Heres a brain dropping... Construction Bulldozer!

I can just see it now, Like you can 'automate' terraformers in Alpha Centauri, You could bulldoze land into water to create a land bridge, that could then also be blown to bits

Wow that would be fun!

I'm imagining playing a campaign (I know there won't actually be one) where you get a new unit called the ranger, and there's a cinematic with a peewee going "You'll have to toss me! I cannot jump the distance!" At a river, and then the ranger (Large kbot unit) grabs it and throws it accross...

Good fan video idea

How about we get the option to straight up pave over water? Leave some gaps for shipyards to ship the ships off to other planets and turn the rest into workspace for factories.

I do not think bridges will be worth putting in the game, or destructible terrain (other than planets blowing ex asteroids and moons too) if there are bridges it will be a land bridge that is part of the map.

Agree, bridges create a whole new tactic/strategic option. Units which can nanolathe them and have the ability to destroy/repair them.

Imagine a cloaking field hiding the build of a bridge from the impassable canyon behind the enemy base. Then you begin to warp in your force ready to surprise a rear attack just after a frontal assault - that'll be a nice surprise.

With deformable terrain, why not just have the terrain adjust to the bridge's needs on both sides?

I think a huge opportunity is being missed here and I haven't seen anyone else mention it.
Why not have hydroelectric dams that function as energy generation and a bridge and possibly some terraforming via reservoir formation/draining?
This would have more than enough gameplay elements to justify including it imo.