a little bit of 'variety' or 'customization'

Hi all,
I did a quick search and found no thread, that involves my problem. If you find one please link me there^^

I know there won't be commander upgrades. I also know that Jon doesn't like unit customization very well and that there won't be different factions.
When asked about factions Jon always says that they simply use the best version of everything so everyone will have the same units. But here's the problem: In the game there are people who fight against each other. Fighting is often a result of different opinions. What if different people have different opinions on what is the best kind of unit? Maybe one commander likes hover-tanks that also can go over water and have an energy or laser based main weapon best while another commander thinks a tank with old-fashioned tracks and a kinetic or explosive projectile is far better? Both have pros and cons. IMO the 'best' of something depends on what you like and how you use it.

One approach to this problem would be a huge number of different units, another would be the following: You may have the same units in general but one can modify them to a certain degree. Let's say there is some kind of a basic tank. It has tracks and a normal kinetic main weapon. But there is also a 'research' building where you can choose between a few upgrades/customizations/modifications. One would not be able to activate all of them because some exclude each other; like you can either have the energy weapon that may have a little stun effect but does only single target damage or you can have an explosive shell that does area damage.

This is just an idea of mine but I tink this 'everyone uses the exact same units - everytime' kind of thing is a bit unrealistic. If one could say what war machinery is the best the miltitaries of modern countries wouldn't use a different set of technology each.

What do you say?

No, SupCom2 showed us the effect this type of thing has on the game. Neutrino said it best(thought I don't recall the exact quote) But basically if a variant or upgrade is enough to cahnge the unit, that means theres room to include a whole new unit. Basically what's better, 5 units you can upgrade, for 50 distinct and unique units?

All players might have the same unit pool, but to me the ultimate goal of the system is such that 2 players doing different strategies will never have to build the same units as thier opponent. people will be able to take the unit pool and play based on how they want to play, but not how the 'faction' was made to play.

Mike

That may be true but it would need a huge amount of units. How probable is it that they are going to do this?

Btw: in supcom 2 in the end every unit simply had every possible upgrade. they didn't exclude each other. you didn't have to choose wisely.

Have you seen the Whitebox Pics? Those show what at the time Uber considered the "bare Minimum" needed to start chipping away at how core gameplay worked, with the intent of adding units as they find they need them along with post release content updates that would add further units over time. Combine that with the core intent of having two Tiers with no powergap where T1 are basic/general purpose units and T2 houses all teh specialist units and you get a system that has lots of room for unit variety and no need for Unit upgrades.

So your saying, you want to lock your self into being better at certain aspects instead of being able to effectively reply to an opponent in all cases? Supcom2 had this issue in a slightly different manner, imagine a game, you're going along the land tree, and you scout my base, golly, seems like I've been going along the structure Tree, and then I planet down a Nuck Launcher, what do you do? You're stuck because in order to even get an Anti-Nuck you need to invest into the Structure tree, you could try to attack, but because I've been going down the structure tree my defenses might be able to hold you off.

Part of the whole point to have unit variety is to prevent players from locking in to the point where they can't change strategies, it doesn't matter if you've been building Bots all game long, you can plot down 5 Tank Factories without having to worry that your tanks are 'weaker' than mine.

Think of it this way, instead of upgrading your tank to have AOE, you build Artillery, instead of upgrading a Bot to have longer range, you Build a Sniper Bot. It's all about defining your Army via composition, rather than having such an unhealthy focus on individual unit/unit types.

Mike

Ok if they add enough units to make modifications unnecessary then everything's fine.

Also, I never mentioned a tech tree. I hate them. What I meant was that every unit you can have has a few possible modifications to better suit your playstyle. It isn't necessary that these modifications are selected in a research building. They could be implemented in the unit menu, too. Maybe they don't even count for every unit but only for the ones you have selected although this would add that kind of micromanagement that Jon also dislikes.

The second one would be very similar to the Dawn of War series where you have a squad of 6 people with assault weapons but you could give all of them a rocket launcher or a flamethrower or three of each or two tocket launchers two flamethrowers and two stick with the assault rifle and so on. I like this system very much but as I said that would add a lot of micromanagement. That's why I suggested overall modifications.

In the end we can just hope they find a good solution. It would be a shame if the matches always ended with two armies of only one single unit type meeting halfway between the bases and the player with slightly better economy won.

I don't think we need unit upgrades, but there does need to be a distinct feel as one progressives from early, to mid, to late game. If all we've got is T1 and T2 specialists, is the battle going to look the same twenty minutes in as it does 2 hours in? I suppose getting out into space will really change things up. We don't need Experimental Units (FA is still perfectly playable, no need to mirror it), but what am I going to be building that lets me know I'm officially in the end game?
One method of changing the game, while using the same units, is the insertion cannon used one the asteroid in the video. Dropping guys wherever you want on the planet, bypassing whatever turret wall or intervenening armies are there will be huge. Doesn't matter that the guy is the same ol' T1 bot from the beginning of the game.

The unit canon is confirmed and planned, just not implemented yet.

But consider, that in this game, what is classical end game, is barely mid game, and utterly avoidable. It's possible to have a battle that is a giant game of cat and mouse, hopping from planet to planet, trying to rapidly build up surgical armies to snipe Commanders, with no massive armies, no entrenched defenses, just constant skirmishes and fleeing and chasing. It's also possible that end game on one planet is simply a first stepping stone, and barely mid game at all. You amass a massive army and take over the home world completely, only to find the opposing commander has been hiding out in the asteroid belt for 5 minutes, building engines and preparing.

There is no classical end game, because it can all be reset to the stone age in the blink of an eye. And the flow economy only reinforces that, if you are on a planet and you dominate it absolutely, and you have massive amounts of storage there, even if you get your commander off the planet before the hammer falls, you still have to restart your economy from zero.

i'm sure they'll include heavy variations of units and a superbot

The only customization I need is selecting a primary (and hopefully a secondary) color for my units.

I envision to be the endgame like this: (pure speculation now)

Massive armies fight at a standstill in the middle of a large continent on the main planet. Huge transports bring in units from asteroid factories only to be shot down by ground-to-orbital defenses. One player readies an asteroid with engines to be a KEW while the other has built up a enormous supply of nukes to overwhelm him. Meanwhile, the third player is hiding in orbit around the gas planet, building an Implosion Device with its abundant resources to destroy the whole system in a reverse big bang. :twisted:


But yeah, I expect a tons of different units, with more coming after release to fill any role that needs filling and to have an every changing metagame. :mrgreen:

Well, don't forget you'll have large variety, so the units you use on a naval/island planet/biome will be different than what you might use in the mountains or in the middle of rolling dunes, and you'll subtly shift what units you might use even within those biomes based on what your opponent is doing.

You'd be right if we were talking about SupCom, because while there is a fair number of units you only use a subset of them at any given time due to the way Tiers were balanced.

My favorite example to use when talking about unit Variety is AA, in particular AA Weapons, you have 3 main types;

Direct Fire: Average Damage, range, RoF ect, Jack of all trades really.
Flak(AOE): Low Damage, shorter range, higher RoF and Medium/large AOE, Great for swarms.
Missile: Long Range, High Damage, low RoF, maybe some AOE, Great for tougher/Slower Targets

So you get a system where no weapons is overall better, just in certain circumstances. They also have a great synergy and work together to form a nice layered defense. You missile weapons would take the first shots , deal some initial damage, then as they get closer your direct fire weapons take part, then your Flak comes in to chew up anything remaining or if they have such a big force that the first 2 layers are ineffective.

And there's still room for variants and such even within that framework, so don't write off variety quite yet! ;p

Mike