Flow Field Base Building?

We are all used to selecting the construction unit, and then finding the item we want to build, then choosing where it should be built, and watching the bot go off and do its thing.

But what if we completely separated the building process away from having to actually target a specific unit.

Lets say we have a list of structures that we can create, and we can just select and place the template for it on the ground where we want it built. We could then leave the game to automatically attract construction robots who are near by to come to it and start manufacturing it without us needing to go and find a bot ourselves. When you place the building down, this could alter the cost field for the area making it a more attractive location for your construction bots to want to visit.

Now lets say you want to build up your defenses on one side of your base, you could highlight the buildings that are waiting to be constructed, and drag a slider bar (or press a keyboard shortcut) to increase its importance, which would apply a greater attractive force on the bots, maybe even making them leave their current assignment because they know something else is more important).

I'm thinking that this approach could free you from having to micro manage everything (or at least most of the mundane stuff).

Interesting idea but alot of people like to design there bases them selves and set up their defences how they like. Sins of a Solar Empire has a feature like it which is good when you have alot of worlds to manage but i dont think it will be that much of a problem in PA

This sort of thing is not what flow fields are for; it's a pathing tool, and there's several issues with using it as an attraction (or repelling) force, especially where multiple goals are present. Note that the flow fields aren't omni-present; they are only created when needed. This means a new flow field for every engineer in the game on your team whenever a new building is placed. It'd be much simpler for the engine to give a move order for the closest idle engineer.

That aside, it actually seems more complicated for the user than simply assigning engineers manually, although being able to place the blueprint down without first selecting an engineer would be nice.

Evil Genius had a construction system like this. You just selected what you wanted to build and where you wanted it built. Then the game figured out how many builders to assign to the job, which ones to assign, and moved them around as needed for you. It even let you set priorities for build jobs. It really abstracted the build process to a very strategic level by taking away all of the micro.

However Evil Genius was not an RTS and I think that some people take great joy in micro managing how their base is constructed.

I don't think this would remove the micro aspect. Because you could always select a bot and order it to do something.

Evil Genius, never heard of it, but it sounds like an interesting game, will have to take a look at that.

As a gut reaction I say this could be done, but likely not in the way you are talking about, through the flow field. Waypoints on the integration field are the only "Attractive" Force effecting the flow field generation, and since the point of maximum attraction value on waypoints seems likely to be and remain at 0, Your max priority would almost always get all of your bots, rather than distributing them evenly.
It's possible to counter that problem, and I can see it in my head right now, the problem is that as best as I could tell it would involve arbitrarily generated cost fields for all the units in your build schedule pod, and modifying those costs and goals in real time as projects are completed or given higher priority, or supplied with sufficient units. The problem being that this sort of thing would likely eat into the benefits of the cost field and would potentially require a restructuring of the unit's coding. (That is to say, the units as I am, likely inaccurately, imagining them would require complete restructuring)

This sort of thing would best be handled as a set of algorithms for the units on top of the flow field, setting waypoints for each unit for you, in respect to the build plans and priorities you've fed it. Which is to say, the flow field itself has trivial baring on this topic, as this would present a challenge that would be, effectively the same as the challenge it presents to traditional pathfinding.

BUT, despite my sense that I've got a solid grasp on this topic, the more I'm seeing the developers talk about these things, the more I feel like I must be failing to consider some concept somewhere. So, take what I say with a grain of salt I suppose.

OP is looking for Dwarf Fortress.

Flow Field has nothing to do with Base Building, a better way to look at it is something like this;

Quick Build Option

Quick Build(HenceforthQB) is a tool/option to compliment the usual Build style as seen in SupCom/FA. How QB would be accessed I'm not sure what would be best, but I imagine it would be very similar to an 'Idle Engineer' button. When Selected/enabled, it would allow the player to place down structures for construction with the intent that the Game will select the appropriate engineer for the build/buildings(if queued up).

HOW it selects the appropriate engineer is likely to be a touchy subject, ideally it'd pull from Idle Engineers(thus why it's similarly placed to the Idle Engy Button) but they may not always be in optimal position, so it might come down to a combination of proximity and if a group of engies are working on the same project.

So say you wanted an Extra Factory, you use the QB to place it and the game goes through the engies, 3 are Idle, but transit time is unreasonable* so it starts going through the 'active' engies, 2 are rather close, but one already is building an Air Factory and the other is building a row of Power Generators, but slightly farther away 6 Engineers are assisting a Factory, so it would pull one of those Engineers to build the new Factory. It could even send that pulled Engineer back to it's prior project(if it's still applicable) otherwise it would simply become idle when the QB project is complete.

*Obviously exact ranges for these kinds of checks are highly debatable, but this is just a concept!

Now before I get dog-piled for proposing an "Automation Feature" this I like because this is more so streamlining a process, the only way the QB process differs from the traditional building is that the player doesn't explicitly select the Engineer(s), and even then, having a basic understanding of the selection formula can allow for understanding where the engineer(s) are likely to come from.

It's also not a replacement for traditional building but rather a supplement, it works well for those lower priority tasks, you can within 3 seconds lay out a row of Pgens and shift back to whatever was pulling your attention, it can even be done from Max Zoom(unless you're being exact with placement).

So it's a concept, still rough around the edges? heck yes, but workable I think.

Mike

It's a case that can be solved with orders as a first class entity.

Okay, explain that one to me. I'm not positing that this problem cannot be solved, but I do posit that no priority shifting could solve attempting to do this through the flow field.

However, this post is ambiguous enough, that I can't tell whether you are simply stating that building priority could be achieved, or if it can be achieved through the Flow Field, Integration and Cost Fields. So please clarify.

As in, an order exists as an entity of its own and the only interaction you do to units is attaching a unit to a set of orders. Very interesting and powerful, but also gets messy quick if not done right.

Mike. I like your idea. This kind of automation, especially as an option, is Okay with me.

That is all.

Well sound a lot like my idea for logistics in the tec concept behind it.
This could also be used for automatic mex buidling (as in no building selection and placing, rather than just chose angineers and press the auto build mex button).

It's an interesting idea, but ultimately I think direct control would feel better for this game and be less complicated, as it would simply use the standard command interface instead of some newfangled build interface.

Perhaps there could be a button that highlights unused workers nearby to allow you to select them and send them to the new construction project though.

Age of Empires has something like this, and it has proved useful. I don't recall if TA did or not, and I never played SupCom.

It would solve the issue of easily attracting unused construction workers to your new project without having to do some more complex process or really make too many changes to the game mechanics.

Scroll through idle workers, you mean? In Supreme Commander, idle Engineers (and ACU) show up on the sidebar.

Yeah, that is exactly what I mean. Showing them on the sidebar would work just as well. Maybe even highlighting them somehow on the Mini-map. So long as they are easy to find.

Highlighting them on the minimap (and strategic zoom) would be a cool feature, indeed.

The idea for this thread is discussed in detail here:

Orders as First-Class Entities (OFCEs)