Shield generators

Discussion in 'Backers Lounge (Read-only)' started by gaynessteel, April 22, 2013.

?

Should shields be in the game?

  1. Yes like in supcom or supcom:FA

    67 vote(s)
    32.7%
  2. Can be toggled before a game starts

    63 vote(s)
    30.7%
  3. No

    75 vote(s)
    36.6%
  1. gaynessteel

    gaynessteel New Member

    Messages:
    24
    Likes Received:
    0
    Impossible to shoot over walls? I doubt it. Artillery will be pretty useless if it keeps hitting a wall.
  2. defy89

    defy89 Member

    Messages:
    44
    Likes Received:
    1
    Sometimes it's better to just leave some things get covered in dust rather than trying to clean them all. ;)
  3. Moranic

    Moranic Member

    Messages:
    111
    Likes Received:
    3
    You missed the entire point here.
    The arty completely eliminates the aspect of a good player that has to be a proper attacker! If you can build just enough units to deal with the enemy, you can destroy his everything using artillery. Building artillery therefore shows you are not capable of attacking someone directly and therefore you will coward in your base shooting shells at the enemy from long distances. I do not see the superiority here.
  4. nanolathe

    nanolathe Post Master General

    Messages:
    3,839
    Likes Received:
    1,887
    If you win with artillery and nothing else then you are using a more superior strategy than the other player.

    You executed a strategy (artillery spam) and your opponent LET you do it. It is a strategy with an inherent risk, namely it isn't very mobile, takes a long time and a lot of Metal and Energy to accomplish.

    If you as an opponent failed to counter his strategy of "Sit here and Tech Up" then you deserve to lose.

    ---

    Building a unit that can kill the enemy without a chance for retaliation may be "Dishonourable" and "Cowardly" in your eyes... but it sure seems more intelligent to me than wasting mass on tanks to die pointlessly in no-mans land.
  5. BulletMagnet

    BulletMagnet Post Master General

    Messages:
    3,263
    Likes Received:
    591
    Or you could build your own artillery and shoot back.

    If your opponent cleverly targets your artillery as you build it, preventing you from recovering; then your opponent is better than you because they achieved the same strategy before you did. Whatever it was they did; they did it faster than you.

    There's no RTS honour-code about proving superiority. If it works, then you are better. I'd rather be a cowardly victor, then a brave dead man. I don't see superiority in a grave.
  6. thechessknight

    thechessknight Member

    Messages:
    36
    Likes Received:
    2
    Has anyone pointed out the fact that in PA there will be many places artillery will not be able to reach. for example behind a moon, behind tall mountains, underwater and other planets that are out of range. considering this I do not see the need for shields... but they would be cool if Uber wanted to add them.
  7. thetrophysystem

    thetrophysystem Post Master General

    Messages:
    7,050
    Likes Received:
    2,874
    I either don't want shields and would like artillery not to be able to smash buildings down in one shot and be rapid fire and infinite range...

    Or I want shields or anti-projectile that does just that: Anti-projectile, at a number-of-projectiles per time-it-takes-for-artillery-to-shoot. An anti-projectile device like a trophy system for artilery shells or a shield, but it only pops an occasional shell out of the sky that is going to land so close to the shield/trophy. This basically makes it a tower with a limited range to protect a structure or two with.

    If it is in game, it should probably be slightly more costly to build than artillery. Either way, artillery probably shouldn't doom the opponent with 3 well placed shots, and if an anti-artillery is put in the game it shouldn't be strong enough or spammable enough to stop all-out artillery rain.

    Also, obviously, this would probably be the very first tier of anti-projectile defense. It wouldn't cover nukes or asteroids. Larger ones, likewise, wouldn't have the accuracy to stop small shells, so you would need both.

    I too put no shields. This game can do something fresh.

    Also this. With such mapspace, one could easily up to mid-game escape back to a better location and refortify with most their technology intact, having a chance to make a comeback. So one pretty much built in defense to artillerty: backpedalling.
  8. bmb

    bmb Well-Known Member

    Messages:
    1,497
    Likes Received:
    219
    I don't see why you need to attack directly. That is not part of the premise of the game, winning is. There's this decidedly anti-turtle mentality around here when a turtle is already at a natural disadvantage simply because of how the resourcing works.

    I don't see why it shouldn't be a valid playstyle.
  9. gaynessteel

    gaynessteel New Member

    Messages:
    24
    Likes Received:
    0
    I've heard somewhere that you can move an asteroid into orbit around a planet. So the enemy only has to send something back and spam artillery on his asteroid then move it around to keep hitting his target.
  10. antillie

    antillie Member

    Messages:
    813
    Likes Received:
    7
    I say they just put the engine and other underlying bits needed for shields into the game and then let the modding community make the actual shields.
  11. teradyn

    teradyn Member

    Messages:
    232
    Likes Received:
    0
    Actually, we have knocked artillery shells out of the air in real life in 2004.
  12. igncom1

    igncom1 Post Master General

    Messages:
    7,961
    Likes Received:
    3,132
    Why not just let stealth generators re-hide spotted targets, meaning that scouting for bombardment should then be consistent if you want to continuously bombard?

    Then artillery defences would rely on preventing spotters rather then tackling the problem directly by stopping shells?

    It would also bring more life to stealth war-fair due to the problems in supcom where it become ineffective once you were spotted just the once.
  13. gaynessteel

    gaynessteel New Member

    Messages:
    24
    Likes Received:
    0
    Because it will be extremely illogical for unmovable buildings to disappear especially once the enemy knows its there.
  14. sauceboss

    sauceboss Member

    Messages:
    34
    Likes Received:
    0
    This. Knowledge is power. Israel has been using this system too if I recall.
  15. igncom1

    igncom1 Post Master General

    Messages:
    7,961
    Likes Received:
    3,132
    Why? Why not leave it for the player to remember where buildings where if they are protected by a stealth field?

    I think it would be a fun mechanic to have that would make stealth fields useful once a player has scouted them, because that's a real problem in supcom, that once spotted they become useless.

    Have them scramble enemy cameras attempting to record the location and thus leave no vision through the fog of war. (Not that I think of it, seeing enemy buildings explode through the fog of war is also kinda stupid.)
  16. cornflakes91

    cornflakes91 New Member

    Messages:
    5
    Likes Received:
    0
    the problem is logic: when you can make a picture of the building your computer system will make a note "building at this position" why should a computer with centuries advancement over our current computer system forget that note only because the enemy builds an stealth generator at that position?
  17. bmb

    bmb Well-Known Member

    Messages:
    1,497
    Likes Received:
    219
    And also again, to reduce micro. The more the computer can remember for you the less you need to focus on microing a scout and remembering what is there.
  18. igncom1

    igncom1 Post Master General

    Messages:
    7,961
    Likes Received:
    3,132
    Mechanically the idea is fine, I don't see the problem.
  19. bmb

    bmb Well-Known Member

    Messages:
    1,497
    Likes Received:
    219
    Usually in supcom I just send a scout to the enemy base and forget about it, then inspect the scouted structures afterward.
  20. bobucles

    bobucles Post Master General

    Messages:
    3,388
    Likes Received:
    558
    This already happens, if you defend with units instead of structures. Keeping the target revealed is just one of the downsides of using structures.

Share This Page